Woman “thought that this could be the end”
A Littleton woman who said she was dragged by a rope around her neck into the woods and sexually assaulted survived the attack by managing to free herself and run half-naked into the Platte River Trail while screaming for help.
Two bicyclists came to Vanessa Ursini’s aide and helped apprehend her attacker, a man police say is a repeat sex offender. Littleton police are not releasing the man’s photograph because other agencies have sexual assault cases they are investigating.
The Denver Post does not normally name the victims of sexual assault, but in this case Ursini said she wanted to tell her story in hopes of helping other women avoid becoming assault victims.
“As some of you may have heard I was involved in a horrific incident yesterday morning, so I thought I would take some time to share what happened to me to help create awareness to all of my friends and family,” Ursini wrote in a Facebook post Thursday.
Littleton police arrested convicted sex offender Johnny Dewayne Harris Jr., 48, on suspicion of kidnapping and sexual assault.
Ursini was walking her dog, Berreta, at about 7:15 a.m. Wednesday on a loop she regularly takes on the Platte River Trail. She was a short walk from her home when a man she recognized from a day earlier passed her, she wrote.
“The man didn’t make eye contact with me and I got a very strange vibe,” Ursini wrote.
The man cut through the woods to get to the other side of the loop, apparently knowing where Ursini was headed, she wrote. She said, “Excuse me,” when she walked by him.
“About 30 seconds later I noticed him very close behind me. I saw he had a rope in his hands and at that point he was too close to try and put any distance between us,” she wrote. “He strangled me from behind and drug me into the woods about 15 feet off the trail where he removed almost all of my clothes. He continued to choke me using his hands, the rope and with a bandanna of some sort.
“I fought like hell and screamed my brains out. Even my sweet dog tried to fight him and bite him as much as she could. He threatened to kill me, I believe to get me to stop screaming. I thought that this could be the end, but I was not about to give up fighting for my life.
“He hog tied me from my neck to my wrists, then to my ankles and told me he was going to let me go but he needed to find his glasses first. He searched for them multiple times and couldn’t find them. I begged him to let me help, but he said he couldn’t trust me,” she wrote.
Ursini managed to sit up, reach the knot tied around her ankles and free herself.
“I had no choice at that point but to run for my life as fast as I could, unfortunately without my dog,” she wrote. “I made it to the bike path almost completely naked screaming for help. I’m so thankful there were people around that ultimately were able to protect me.”
Two men on bikes chased the suspect down and hemmed him in until police arrived a few minutes later, said Cmdr. Trent Cooper of the Littleton Police Depart- ment.
“They did exactly what Good Samaritans should do. They got involved, but not so involved that they endangered themselves,” Cooper said.
“We’re looking at whether other cases are related to him.”
Later, Ursini was able to find her dog.
“This was the worst day of my life, but I knew I had to fight. It simply wasn’t my time to die,” Ursini wrote. “I still feel like I got hit by a freight train, but I am lucky to be in good hands today with my family and friends.”
Ursini warned people to always stay alert.
“I am putting this post up to remind each and every one of you, please be aware of your surroundings at all times. Even if you have been on your local path, your grocery store parking lot or anywhere 100 times, danger can exist anywhere. I am lucky to be alive, so please have a plan in place to protect yourself from whatever may be out there,” she wrote.