Woman Glad To Be Alive After Slashing On Brooklyn Street
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- A slashing suspect ran from the scene of an attack in Brooklyn and left a woman wounded on the street, and the woman knows she could have been killed.
But on Friday afternoon, Jannina Popko was out of the hospital and speaking to CBS2's Scott Rapoport.
"It's terrible," Popko said. "That all I can say."
The bandage of Popko's neck concealed a brutal wound. The gash across her throat required 13 stitches.
Popko was slashed with a knife in Ditmas Park on Thursday by an attacker she never saw coming. But ask her about it, and she also offers another perspective.
"I am very lucky, and very grateful," she said.
She said she was grateful to be alive.
Police said the attack happened just before 10 a.m. Thursday on Beverley Road off Rugby Road. The attacker approached the victim from behind, and slashed her neck without warning or saying a word, and then ran off – leaving behind a knife and what appeared to be an American flag bandana.
It was an all-out ambush, Popko said.
"(He said) nothing -- breathing and slash," she said. She added that she had never seen the man and did not recognize him in any way.
The victim said she was on her cellphone at the time of the attack, and said it left her vulnerable."
"Better be aware," she said. "Don't stay on the cellphone like you're walking. That's what I was doing. I was looking at my text messages."
A good Samaritan, who asked not to be identified, said Thursday that she took off her own shirt and gave it to the victim to try and stop the bleeding.
"She said she was walking down the street on the phone and a gentleman came up from behind her and cut her in the neck and ran off," the woman told CBS2's Andrea Grymes. "We kept pressure on her neck until they came and tried to keep her calm."
Meanwhile, home surveillance camera captured home video of the man, wearing a gray hooded sweat shirt and dark pants, and running on Argyle Road toward Cortelyou Road.
Back at the scene Friday, there was a large police presence and a plethora of posters – showing the suspect and offering a reward for information in yet another slashing in the city.
As of late Friday afternoon, there had been no arrests. And the attack had Popko, 53, and her husband terribly concerned.
"If somebody just attacks you from behind, how do you defend yourself?" Popko's husband said.
The outcome of the attack could have been a lot worse for Popko. She said she was lucky her wound was not too deep.
