Melbourne Police are searching for suspects after a shooting involving a cyclist on the Eau Gallie Causeway.

  • Cyclist shot with pellet gun in Melbourne
  • Melissa Sheppard has a pellet lodged in her thigh
  • Police are looking for the suspects  

Melissa Sheppard has a stressful career as an RN, but a Sunday afternoon bike ride to clear her turned to shock when someone shot her with a high-powered pellet gun.

“(I was) just going up the bridge, then all of a sudden felt this sting and heard the sound of a gun,” Sheppard said. “There was a hole in my leg and it was bleeding.”

The pellet lodged in her thigh. She stopped to look at the wound, and then saw a car with four people inside. She said they appeared to high-five each other.

"I have this bag they had to get through a lot of obstacles to get through when they shot me,” Sheppard said as she pointed under the bike seat. “I had to have my leg up. That they would do that to me, then be happy about it."

"Something hit me, and I heard the sound of the gun," she told a 911 dispatcher after the shooting.

"If she got hit somewhere else, she could have fallen off her bike, fallen into traffic," said Lt. Cheryl Trainer of the Melbourne Police Department.

Sheppard has the backing of the cycling community, which has reached out in droves to support her.

Her doctor says the pellet must stay in her body indefinitely for her safety.

"I now have a bullet stuck in my leg, the rest of my life, it's a constant memory of what happened to me that day," she said. "And on my favorite thing I love to do, my bike."

Sheppard has to stay off her bike a few weeks per doctor's orders, but she is doing everything she can to help police find the suspects.

Police are increasing patrols in the area and urge anyone with information to get in touch.