Driver says he was shot in Chinatown for trying to help an older man being beaten

CHICAGO (CBS) -- A rideshare driver said he got shot in Chinatown this week after stepping in to try to help a man he saw getting beaten up.

At 1:40 a.m. Wednesday, Paul Bessette was shot while in his car in the 2200 block of South Wentworth Avenue —just south of Cermak Road in the heart of the Chinatown community.

He showed the wound on the right side of his chest, where he said the bullet was cut out in surgery. There was even a bullet hole in his seat belt.

Bandages now cover his wounds.

"It was crazy," Bessette said. "It was like, really kind of like something you never think you'd go through in life."

Yet this week, Bessette was sitting in his Tesla waiting for a rideshare passenger to return. He spotted an elderly man getting attacked in Chinatown.

"And there's a guy getting beat up in the middle of the street—then he started bleeding from his head," said Bessette.

Despite it being after 1 a.m., Bessette felt compelled to do something.

"I moved my car over towards them and I honked my horn, just, I don't know, to get them to stop," he said.

The horn got the attention of the attackers. But instead of running off, they focused on Bessette—and what happened next left him bleeding in the front seat.

"One of the guys turned around and shot me," he said.

The bullet shattered the passenger window of Bessette's car and pierced the seatbelt.

"I just didn't really even know what had happened," he said. "But I felt the pain, and so I like clenched my chest like that, and then I then I zoomed out of there."

Bessette sped off, dialed 911, and waited for police and an ambulance to show up. He went to the hospital, and amazingly, it turned out the bullet had hit his chest—and had not touched any vital organs.

"You know, I was blessed to walk away," he said. "I'm able to literally walk out of the hospital four hours later."

Bessette spoke to CBS News Chicago with a backdrop of palm trees behind him. After being released from the hospital, he hopped on a planned trip to Florida to see his parents—for a hug he desperately needed.

"Life gets to go on," he said. "You know, like, this is just something that happened—and I'm glad it's behind me."

As he recovers, Bessette is frustrated by the crime going on in Chicago. Meanwhile, so many have questioned why he got involved.

"Yeah, I mean, to the people that say: 'Put your head down. Look the other way. This is stuff that happens in the city all the time,' you know, that doesn't have to," he said. "People should help people."

As for the man Bessette tried to help, he said that man was taken to the hospital with head injuries. CBS News Chicago has reached out to police to find out how the man is doing.

Police separately warned of a robbery pattern in Chinatown—which included an incident around the same time as the shooting that wounded Bessette, and on the same block.

No one has been arrested in Bessette's shooting, the attack on the older man, or the robberies.