Haunting True Stories & Important Lessons From 9 People Who Survived Attempted Murder
Absolutely chilling.
andreiuc88 / 123RF Often when we read stories of violence and anger, we focus on murder or the missing. People who didn't make it out of the dark grasps of their assailant, and never again saw the light of day.
We know those people fought for their lives, but the gruesomeness of the homicide or the hunt for who-done-it overshadows their resilience.
But sometimes, people fight hard enough. They find an escape. They play dead. They hit back. They get out.
There's no way to really compare a murder from an attempted murder, seeing as all cases are different. While we love to read the dark stories with no happy endings, it's important to pay as much attention to the stories of survival.
Here are nine accounts from people who survived an attempted murder that we found on Reddit:
1. The person whose life was saved by adult entertainment
"I was shot while working in a small independent video game shop. This place was a very small store in a somewhat sketchy area, but we had never had problems before. On the night in question, a gentleman came in and, without saying a word, goes straight into the porn section/caged off area. The gentleman emerges from the porn cage with his selections and proceeds to toss his selections on the counter.
Now this part is very important. I go to retrieve the discs for the pornography in question, which we kept in giant CD binders that held about 500-750 discs when completely full, which they were in this case, since we had just received some new stuff. As I turn to place the binders on the counter, I hear what I now know to be the hammer being cocked.
At the time I thought nothing of it since it is a video game store and we had demos on and available for people to play. As I turned to face the customer, I can now see the customer has a gun out and pointed at me. A moment or two passed with neither of us saying anything, and me holding the binders in front of my chest. And then he pulled the trigger.
I don't remember much else after that, mostly because I was face down on the ground trying very hard not to move, breathe obviously, or make any kind of noise. I hear him go through the register (he got all $60 in there) and then go through the game cases (he stole at least five empty PSP game cases) before he bolted.
According to the EMTs who tended to me, the bullet traveling through the stack of three completely full(ish) CD binders slowed the bullet down enough to the point where it hardly penetrated. It only went about 1-2 inches deep, and I somehow managed to get hit in the one area of my chest/shoulder area where nothing vital was."
2. The person who got stabbed in the back with a samurai sword
"When I was 20, I was at a friend's cousin's house hanging out. My friend's brother had recently been released from prison for a 3rd time and she was slated to keep an eye on him. Now, I knew this guy before he was incarcerated, and was pretty normal. But I could tell that the inside had changed him dramatically; he barely spoke, usually to ask for a cigarette. Very creepy demeanor.
I had given him a couple of smokes during a few hours of hanging out, but I'm now down to my last two. He asks for another smoke, but being a young broke guy, I don't want to deplete my stock right then and there, but at the same time I don't want to deny a man the full rich flavor of my Marlboro. So I tell him I'm going to light one and I'll short him on it. Everything seems okay.
He gets up to go to the bathroom and comes back wielding a samurai sword that was hanging as decoration in the bathroom. My back is to him and I get blindsided in the back if the head! Luckily, he doesn't have all of his faculties about him and hits me with the flat side of the sword.
I'm not so lucky on the next hit. As I turn around, stunned, he slices me from the corner of my right eye halfway to my ear. The impact completely shattered my orbital bone. So I then grab my face, pull back my hand to see it covered in blood. S*** has gone crazy!
So crazy in fact, I didn't even feel him thrust the sword into my back, about an inch away from my spine. So my friend's cousin is watching all this unfold and runs over and disarms him, taking him down for a while. I drudge up the stairs for help, and I feel my back getting wet from blood. That's when I knew I had been stabbed in the back. But I'm still walking so I know my spine wasn't hit!
So with all my strength, I make it to the first floor. I walk into the front room where my friend's cousin's wife is sitting with 4 younger kids. Needless to say my bloodied face causes a panic upstairs. I collapse on the floor and the last thing I see before my eyes are completely filled with blood, is the cousin beating the s*** out of my assailant with a folding chair WWE style and throws him out the front door.
And I come to find out later that he went nuts on me because in prison, giving someone a short makes them your b****... and he wasn't going to be anybody's b****."
3. The person whose ex-husband killed her ferrets
"Ex husband beat the s*** outta me because our daughter spilled Koolaid. Arresting officer on the scene said it was the 'worse case of domestic violence he has ever seen in his twenty years on the force.' Fractured skull, broken orbit, three teeth kicked out, strangled...
He went to jail, I got a restraining order from my hospital bed. Two years later, I am moved on with my life. Going to school, working two jobs, dating someone new. He shows up on my door begging me back. I tell him, no I moved on. He begins stalking me.
One night I go with my new partner, he finds out my cell phone, begins calling and I answer wondering how someone could be calling from my home. He says if I don't come home now, he will kill my ferrets. I say there is no way I'm coming. And wrote on a paper to my new partner to call the police and send them to my home. Ex starts ranting he will kill himself. He murders pets on phone and I hear it. (I'm was trying to keep him on, so he will stay in my house and the cops can get there. But I freak at the ferret murder part and hang up.)
I call my folks, who have my daughter, to make sure they are okay. They don't answer. I freak and drive over to their house to find them, the car is gone, no one is home, light in the kitchen is on which never happens, doors are locked so I can't get in.
I'm in full panic mode now. I go around the neighborhood trying to find my parents' car. Stop at my sister's to see if she knows. I get out of the car and he comes, pulling out an exacto knife on me, which he holds to my throat, explaining he plans to 'cut me into ribbons.'
Cops come down to my sister's house to find me, my place was ransacked and empty. They called my boyfriend who told them to check my sister's, since I said I would go to my family's different houses until I found my daughter. He goes back to jail, a whole year and a half, whoopie! Pled down by giving info on a drug king pin in town he knew. I have a kid with this turd."
4. The person who accidentally got into a fight with a gang
"I was jumped leaving a party as I was trying to get in my car. Me and my friend Sean decided that the St. Patrick's party we were at wasn't for us and wanted to call it a night. Apparently, some drama was unfolding inside the party that prompted some individuals to call their 'gang buddies,' unbeknownst to me and my friends.
When I got outside of the house to leave, I saw some cars pulling up and thought nothing of it. It was a neighborhood road and, for the most part, I thought more people were going to probably show up to the party!
Well, to my surprise as me and Sean got to the car we were approached by a group of 5 kids all wielding different improvised weapons (chains, bats, golf clubs, pipes). I ask them what's going on and the only response I got was from one of the smaller kids screaming to the rest of his buddies, 'That's the guy who pushed me to the ground!' I quickly tell them they have the wrong guy, and that their buddy is obviously a little inebriated, but they didn't want to hear it from me.
I look at the guy, front row center and realize he's holding a golf club in one hand and looks ready to swing. So pretty much accepting my fate at this point. I get ready to square up and do something with my friend Sean, we knew that the outlook was very grim, but what else were we going to do? I asked him, 'So, what are you going to hit me with that?' and right as I decide I am going to grab this kid's golf club and snatch it from his hands he says, 'Nah with this' and produces a glass bottle from his other hand, which he shatters against my head, downwards.
Immediately, the kid who hits me and all his friends just make this 'Oh s***' face and run. I look to my friend Sean in shock, ears ringing, disoriented, he immediately comes to my aid. In my staggering, I end up realizing that I have blood on my hands.
I ask Sean to look at my head to see if the bottle cut it open, but he didn't find anything, which is when I realize that it feels like warm water is being poured on my chest. So I asked him to look at my neck, and raised my head up, blood squirted a good 7 feet from my neck and Sean's face turned to horror. I grabbed my cell phone and called 911, which I ended up having to hand off to Sean.
I ran to the house where the party was being held and some other friends there came to my aid. To help myself survive, I asked for towels which the party host provided, I wrapped them around my neck tourniquet style and laid as horizontally to the ground as I could waiting for the paramedics. There were plenty of times that I was dozing off, but my friends kept me awake and alert. I pretty much accepted death and was very scared at this point. It was 4 AM, and I knew my mom was never going to see me alive again.
In the end, I lost 2 liters of blood. Doctors said it was a miracle that I survived."
5. The person whose sister tried to choke her for being born
"I don't remember the incident at all, because I was a brand-new baby, but my five-year-old sister was so jealous of my arrival that she tried to suffocate me three times with all three times, my mother catching her. If my mother hadn't been attentive to me, I have no doubt my sister would have succeeded.
She hated me all throughout my childhood. We're best friends now and she is a very decent human being. Funny how life turns out."
6. The other person whose sister tried to kill her
"My sister made three attempts on my life before I moved out (two stabbing attempts and a smothering attempt, though I think the first two were not so much serious attempts as they were practice runs). Days before the move, she made the final attempt.
She was frustrated I hadn't moved away on my 18th birthday and had become progressively more hostile as my last few months of high school dragged on. A week or so before the incident, I had caught her trying to harm the cat and had physically struck her, and that week had been... tense. She would just follow me around and stare at me, and I knew she was waiting for an excuse.
One day, when were were alone and our mother was out on business, she attacked me. Her attacking me was pretty old hat at this point as you might imagine, so I just side stepped her and locked myself in a room, but it was pretty obvious that that day was different.
She was in a blind rage, screaming and throwing herself at the door. The animalistic cries were interspersed with, 'I've always hated you!' 'I wish you were dead!' 'I'll kill you!' After a while, she seemed to blow herself out and there was a brief quiet. Then, a strange scratching came from the door and the knob tumbled off.
I just remember her staring wild-eyed through the hole, that one blood-shot orb rolling until it fixed on me, her pupil contracting just barely. 'I see you...' she rasped. She burst through the door with a foot-long screwdriver over her head, shrieking, foamy spit trailing from the corners of her mouth.
I threw her to the ground and just started driving my knee into her face until she went limp. She didn't land a single hit. I didn't stop until she was in the fetal position, crying with a bloody nose. After I left, she had the nerve to call the police because she felt threatened.
She's recently leveraged the pleasure of her presence in the family against 42 grand. I can't imagine anyone is sorry to see that b**** go. On a lighter note, the excuse she used to try to stab me was a frozen waffle she didn't want me to eat. I call the whole thing the Leggo my Eggo Incident."
7. The person whose mom was almost murdered in an elevator
"She was in her early 20s, coming home late at night. As she got into the elevator to her apartment, a dude got in with her shortly before the door closed. The elevator went up and she noticed that the guy was nervous: breathing heavily and sweating, even though it was cold outside. At some point, he said, 'Don't be afraid, it will be over quickly', and pulled a knife out.
My mom subsequently kicked the dude in the nuts. She immediately hit some random floor and the elevator stopped. She then ran up the stairs to her apartment. The killer followed her and screamed after her, 'I'll catch you b**** and I'll stab you until you bleed to death.'
However, she was faster than him and got into her apartment. The dude didn't know where she went, screamed a bit and let it go. She called the police, of course, but they couldn't find him. Creepy."
8. The person whose ex-boyfriend almost ended their life
"Home on Christmas break when my ex-boyfriend from high school sneaks into my house while my parents are away for a few days, videos, watches, stalks, and plans his attempted murder of me without me knowing.
Later, he pretend shows up at my door, I let him in, not knowing any of the above. He then beats me bloody everywhere, breaking most of my ribs, cuts all my hair off with a butcher knife and holds me hostage for about 12 hours. My saving grace was that the phone rang, and I said to him very calm, 'If that is my parents and you do not let me answer, they will call the police.'
It was not my parents, but a friend, and my friend heard my voice tremble and called the police. I don't know how or why, but it saved my life.
Ten years later, he murdered his girlfriend, put her body in a pickup truck tool case that sits in the back of the pickup, and sunk her to the bottom of a canal in upstate NY. She had been missing several months and her two kids and family were devastated. I had to testify at his murder trial."
9. The person who had the wrong car
"I was leaving work one night, I jump in my car, and head out of the parking lot in a hurry, because I needed to pick up toilet paper from Walmart before I went home. As I get to the road, there is a red Chevy truck parked, blocking the exit with his turn signal on. I wait behind him for a few seconds, and he waves me around, so I exit onto the street through the entrance side, and drive over to Walmart a block away.
I lock my car and get out, and I hear the red truck flying up next to my car. The guy rolls down his window, and starts mumbling and I can't understand him, so I ask him what he needs. He mumbles again, and I say that I am very sorry, but he would have to repeat himself.
He then starts screaming, and it becomes clear, 'I'm going to make you understand boy, I am going to f***ing kill you!' He jumps out of his truck, and I immediately retreat to the other side of my car, and as I do, he punches my car with his bare hand so hard that I felt the car react.
I take off running, and I hear him get in his truck, and take off towards me, he kept trying to hit me, but every time I move around a car, as I am running to the store. I had parked pretty far from the entrance, and it felt like no matter how fast I ran, I wasn't getting any closer.
I finally make it to the gap between where the entrance is and where the first cars are parked, and hesitate, he starts to get out, so I run for the front doors, and just as I make it to the door, I feel his truck right on top of me. He stopped last second, and backed up, parking in front of the door.
I call 911, and they ask if I feel safe to return to my car. I scream at the dispatcher, telling them to get to me right away, and I am not leaving the store. He is just outside yelling and screaming, so I retreat further in. He starts to drive off, so I go grab the toilet paper quickly, and pay for it, because I was in such shock, that I didn't really think about it clearly.
As I return towards the entrance, I see that the truck is gone, so I wait by the door until I see a cop car pull up to my car. I run out, and as I am halfway to my car, I see the red truck again, flying around a corner towards me. I point at the truck, the cop takes off and stops the guy, with three more cop cars flying in behind the truck. They pull the guy out of the car, and start going through his vehicle, finding small knives, and lots of open beer cans.
He tells the police officers that I screwed his girlfriend, and that she had left him for me, so he wanted to make sure she lost everything she had. He was twice the legal limit on alcohol and admitted to doing several types of drugs, and had intended to just talk to me. The big problem here is, I don't know his girlfriend, I hadn't even been on a date in two months, and had no clue how he thought I was the guy he was after.
Turns out, the car I had just bought was the same model as the guy she left him for, and that he found my car while driving through random parking lots. He had been waiting for me to leave work for nearly 4 hours, as our company security cameras had caught him pacing the parking lot earlier.
I have had issues with walking to my car every night leaving work (10 PM) since and still freak out when I see red trucks coming towards me. On top of that, the guy got the charge pleaded down to aggravated menacing, and was told to never go back to my work, or to come near me again. No jail time, just a loss of license for the OVI."
Emily Blackwood is a freelance writer, editor and journalist who covers small business, pop culture, travel, health and wellness.
Editor's Note: This article was originally posted on July 27, 2017 and was updated with the latest information.