Knife-Wielding Thug Appears in Driveway
A University Park woman says she was approached by a knife-wielding thug in her rear driveway this week.
At about 7 p.m. on Sunday, the woman pulled her SUV into her detached garage in the 3600 block of Caruth Boulevard. She neither saw nor heard anything suspicious as she retrieved some items from the back of her vehicle.
“I turned to go into the house,” the woman said in a phone interview Wednesday, “and there was a man standing about 3 feet from me, with a knife raised like he was going to stab me.”
The man, who was wearing a ski mask, said nothing.
“The detective said that was unusual,” the woman said. “A robber will say, ‘give me this, give me that’ — you know.”
The woman began screaming as loud as she could, “and I didn’t stop.” She happened to be holding a cup of water, so she threw it in the man’s face.
Then she started running toward her house, but she fell. As she was getting up, she looked back and saw the man retreating toward the alley.
The woman believes the man gave up because of her screaming, which attracted the attention of her neighbors and husband before long, and because of her appearance.
“I was not carrying a purse,” she said. “I did not have on any jewelry. If that was his motive — rather than harming me — perhaps he thought he stood nothing to gain.”
The woman said police told her she did the right thing by screaming. She said they also advised her to always be aware of her surroundings when returning home alone, advice she is passing on to her friends and neighbors.
