[Don Gwinn]

I wasn't sure I wanted to post this, but I gotta tell somebody. My sister came over today to tell me about what happened to her on Thursday. She's 20 years old and still lives with my parents in our small town, but her boyfriend lives in Springfield, IL.

She went to her boyfriend's house on Thursday morning, her day off. At noon, she came out to her car to find that someone had smashed the small side window on the driver's side and stolen her stereo and cell phone. The idiot apparently picked up her camera and moved it, but didn't take it--strange because the camera is worth more than the car. She was understandably upset. She and her boyfriend decided there wasn't much to be done, though, so she left for home. She was still in Springfield when someone ran a red light and missed her by a few feet, so she pulled into a service station on the corner.

It was about noon on a weekday, so she felt pretty safe. A clean-cut man in a dark blue Buick Regal, mid-eighties vintage, asked her for directions (she and her boyfriend both drive Cutlasses of about that year, so she noticed.)
She was out of her car and actually walked over closer to him to give him directions, completely in condition white.

That's where things went south. With no warning and no sign of anger, the man grabbed her and tried furiously to manhandle her into his car. She screamed and struggled but did not think to strike him and was unarmed. My sister is about 5'4" and around 100 lbs. She says her opponent was about 6' tall but very skinny, almost unhealthily so. A good thing, because a man my size would simply have picked her up and tossed her in. With her feet off the ground she would have been helpless.

She recalls vividly making eye contact with several drivers, but no one stopped. The man had apparently chosen his place as an ambush, because none of the service station's windows faced them and no one inside could see her.

The only reason she escaped was that a patron at the gas station came outside for some reason. This good soul ran over and struck the attacker, which caused him to let go. My sister sprinted for her car immediately, and her rescuer, seeing that she was free, ran immediately for his. She says he shouted at her, asking if she was all right and whether she wanted to come with him, but made no move to follow her. She yelled a hasty "no" and they both drove away as fast as they could, apparently leaving the attacker there.

My sister is friends with a former state cop who now manages a family restaurant a few miles down that road, so she went there. As a former cop, this man is entitled to carry a weapon and does so, and she trusts him. It was probably the smartest thing she did all day. He called the Springfield city police, and the real fun began.

She doesn't have a great deal of faith in police anyway, based on some past experiences with calling for help, and the officer who responded was incredibly rude. He refused even to get out of his car--SHE had to leave what she considered her safe place, the restaurant, to come out to talk with him. He would not allow her friend to come to the scene. Matters improved, however, when his sergeant arrived, and in fairness I have no way of knowing what the man had been dealing with all day.

The bottom line is that the man has not been found. He matches the description of a man who waited in a car as his partner tried to force his way into another woman's car last week, but that doesn't mean it's the same man. My sister is supposed to look at mug shots on Monday. No one from inside the store (except the disappearing rescuer) could see the crime because no windows face that direction, and the security cameras that cover that area were removed a month ago.

The hero who rescued my sister from probable rape and possible death has not come forward. It's possible he thinks he will be in trouble, that perhaps it was a "domestic dispute" in which the woman he saved will press charges against him instead of her attacker. We plan to ask on the radio and in the local newspaper that he come forward, as we hope that he might remember a license plate number or other important information.

My sister, luckily enough, is an artist and photographer by avocation and drew her own sketch of the attacker at the restaurant while waiting for the police, so there are no problems with a clear ID once she sees him.
In the meantime, she is afraid of the dark. The other night she had to let the dog out the front door at 11:30 at night because she couldn't bring herself to go out onto the back porch to open the screen door. She carries her can of mace now, at least, and it's always in hand, not in her purse. The police supervisor is a former instructor at a local Tae Kwon Do studio and is arranging for her to train there.

All these things are good, but I can't help wishing she could have a CCW and a J-frame revolver in a pocket holster in her coat pocket. CCW's are illegal in Illinois and she won't be 21 until April anyway.

I don't know what I expect anyone to say about this, but I needed to tell people who would understand that I don't want to forgive the man, I don't want to "purge the anger from my heart" I just want him to have left my sister alone and failing that, I want him to have died in the attempt to do whatever it was that he wanted to do.

The consensus among the police was that based on her size, clothing and car, the attacker was probably trying to take a young girl, around 16 years old. The sergeant is of the opinion that he planned things too carefully to have done this on impulse and, having been thwarted by my sister and her savior, will now target even smaller girls--which leaves out all but actual children.

I want the attacker captured.
I want to see him face to face as they sentence him to prison time. I will not hurt him myself, I just want to see him sentenced.
I want to meet the man who saved my sister.
I want my sister to be armed and ready to defend herself. I will teach her what she needs to know about awareness now that she is awake and listening, but I can't arm her because she doesn't want to be a criminal and armed self-defense is a crime.