Cold Case Files - I SURVIVED: If I've Hit An Artery I Only Have Minutes Left Of Consciousness

Episode Date: June 8, 2024

Albert is a 17 year old enlisted as a paratrooper at Fort Bragg, when his best friend, fellow soldier, takes him out to a dump for target practice but instead shoots Albert in the stomach and chases him into the forest. Matt is an outdoor enthusiast in New Zealand on the fourth day of a week long hike into the mountains with his dog when he slides over a cliff and lands on jagged rocks. With a severely injured ankle Matt survives for another 11 days after his injury until he can find help. Kristie is 14 years old and has on older sister with an even older friend Paul who has found himself in trouble with the law. One day after coming home from school Kristie finds her sister murdered by Paul before he leads her down to the basement, sexually assaults her, stabs her in the stomach and cuts her throat. Aura: For a limited time visit Aura.com/Trust to sign up for a 14 day free trial and start protecting your loved ones! Huggies: Head to Huggies.com to learn more! Progressive: Multitask right now. Quote your car insurance at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Rosetta Stone: Don’t put off learning that language - there’s no better time than RIGHT NOW to get started! For a very limited time, I Survived listeners can get Rosetta Stone’s Lifetime Membership for 50% off! Visit rosettastone.com/survived  

This episode of I Survived is brought to you by Huggies. Baby butts rejoice. New Huggies skin essentials are here. A brand new dermatologist approved line of diapers, wipes, and pull-ups training pants, all designed with baby's sensitive skin in mind. This program contains subject matter that may be disturbing to some listeners.

Listener discretion is advised. I could see him loading the rifle right then and there. I knew this guy was out to do me harm. Real people. If that's an artery, if I've hit an artery here, I've not got many minutes left of consciousness. Who faced death. And when he came back downstairs, he took my glasses off. And then the next thing I knew, I was being strangled from behind. And lived to tell how.

My gut feeling was to be quiet. So I just laid there and waited for him to shoot me in the head. This is I Survived. It's December 1976 in Fort Bragg, North Carolina. 17-year-old Albert has just enlisted in the Army as a paratrooper. He's stationed with the 82nd Airborne Division at Fort Bragg. I met Kenneth Tai probably about the third week I was there. And he came up to me and the chow hall was really nice to me.

We just hit it off really good, start hanging out together. And I started getting to where he was about my best friend. Ty invited Albert to a New Year's Eve party. Albert met him at the barracks to get ready. He says, I ordered this weapon. He said, it's a survival rifle. So he goes, but I want to take it with us so we can do some target practicing. I said, target practicing?

Well, I thought we were going to a New Year's party. He goes, well, we are. But he said, I want to stop and sight this rifle. Got in the vehicle, started driving through Fort Bragg. We come up to a red light. He says, I hate red lights. And he grabbed the rifle, and he loaded it. And he leaned out the car and took a shot at it.

He missed it, but I was kind of like, what are you doing? He told me I needed to take a shot of whiskey and calmed out. So he pulled into a parking lot. We took a shot of whiskey. And we drove off. It was a full moon that night. So he pulled off this gravel road, went up to the dump, and got out. I went and he said, would you set up some cans over there

so we could shoot at him? And I said, all right. I looked up. I was setting the cans up. He was aiming a rifle. would you set up some cans over there so we could shoot at him? And I said, all right. I looked up, and I was setting the cans up. He was aiming a rifle. And I was down on my knees putting the cans up. And I said, what are you doing? What are you doing? I jumped up, and he kind of giggled.

He thought it was funny. I said, I don't think that's funny. And then I got mad, and I said, you know what? I don't want to do this no more. Let's go. Albert went back to the car, but Ty had disappeared. I started flashing the lights and honking the horn. I jumped out of the car, and I yelled, Kenneth, Ty, I am not into your games. I said, I'm not playing games with you here. Just then, I felt something come through me, a chill,

like something was going to happen. There was something moving around. And I start walking over towards it. And I said, Kenneth, is that you? Next thing I know, the muzzle flash went off, and it hit me in the stomach. I fell down. And I got up, and I yelled, Ty, you shot me.

And I could see him running down the hill already. And I could see him loading the rifle. Right then and there, I knew this guy was out to do me harm. First thing that came to my mind is get up and run. So I got up and run. I took off running down the gravel road. He shot at me again. And he missed.

And the whole time I'm running, I'm yelling, Ty, why are you doing this? Why are you doing this? What did I do to you? He wouldn't answer me. And I got down to the end of the gravel road. When I hit the pavement, I tripped. He shot again. I heard the bullet bounce off the pavement, and I kind of like did a roll, got right up and start running again. My military instincts kicked in and said, get in some cover. That's what I was thinking. So I headed for the tree line. I was checking myself as I ran for an exit wound. I felt behind my back and I couldn't feel where the bullet went out. So I knew the bullet was still in me. And I know that's worse. You know, if there's no exit wound, it even makes it worse, the bullet's still in you.

Albert ran to the woods and collapsed under a fallen tree. I was in so much pain I wanted to scream as loud as I could. So I got underneath the tree and I hid and then he come running up to the tree probably, I'd say, about five, six seconds later. So I closed my eyes and held the pain in and held my breath. He walks around the tree approximately three times, stops right by my head, probably within about two or three feet of my head.

And I didn't open my eyes because in my mind I pictured him aiming a rifle at my head. My you know gut feeling was to be quiet and hold the pain in and hope to god he don't hear me. So I just laid there and waited for him to shoot me in the head. Next thing I know is he took off running back out of the woods. Albert's attacker went back up the road to retrieve his car. Albert got up and started running. The pain started getting really unbearable, and I started yelling a little bit, you know,

oh, you know, hole in my stomach. And then I fell into a creek that was maybe two, two and a half feet maybe, deep of water. And it actually felt good for a split second because it cooled me down because I was so hot. I knew I was getting a fever already. And I was just thinking, are infections already setting in?

I threw my shirt off. I started running again. And I could look back, and I could look back, and I could see Kenneth driving up and down the road, jumping out of the car, and I'd stop and hide. Well, he would jump out, and he would run up into the woods with the rifle and look around. He'd look around for about a minute

and walk out a little ways, and if he didn't see me, he'd turn around and went back out to the car, and then he'd get back in the car and drive slowly along the road. I basically was, just couldn't believe that this was happening to me. It was like a nightmare, and the worst nightmare you could ever have in your life. I just felt like all my energy was gone, and I couldn't do it no more. Went down to my knees, and I looked up in the sky, and I seen the full moon.

And I looked up, and I kind of like said, well, I guess this is it. I got so much of my life ahead of me, and this is what I wanted to do. And this guy ended it all for me. Everything was starting to go dark on me, and that's why I figured I was dying. So I started praying to the Lord,

please don't let me die out here. Not like this. They'll never find me. Next thing I know, I was up running. I got another burst of strength to keep going. Ty was driving slowly along the edge of the forest, hunting for Albert. And I kept myself at a distance to where, you know, I could see the road so I wouldn't get lost in the woods. And I kept looking back and seeing him, getting out, you know, and looking around for me.

Albert was bleeding heavily from the wound in his stomach. I was letting out some moans and stuff because I had to try and let some of the pain out. And I figured I got to get to the main road. I got to make it. And it seemed like it was eternity, like I would never get to the end of this tunnel. Finally, I could see the main road, and I could see cars pulling up,

and I was thinking, oh good, now I can get some help. Now on the outskirts of town, Albert ran to an intersection to get help. The gunman didn't see him and drove in another direction. I went running up to the first car, which had a family in it, and I started banging on the window, yelling, help me. I've been shot. And the whole family got scared, started screaming. They took off, went through the red light.

I tried to run over to the other cars. They all went through the red light and took off. And I was standing in the middle of the four-way then. And I was looking down there. And I could see down on the road where Kenneth was still down there driving around. And I was thinking, oh my god, he's going to, he's still going to catch me. I was thinking, why won't these people stop and help me?

I was about maybe a mile, mile and a half at the most to my barracks. I said, heck with it. I'm going to have to run to my barracks. So I start running, and I maybe ran maybe 100 feet, and then the pain was so bad I was just screaming. And there was a car coming. So I got out and tried to wave him down.

The car floored it around me. He took off too. I seen the next car coming, and it was a car with one headlight coming. And I kept looking back at the other part of the road, seeing if Kenneth was going to come driving up. And I kept looking back, and this time I was walking. I could not run no more. I had no more strength to run.

And I says, well, this guy is going to have to stop, because I'm going to stand in the road, and if he goes around me, I'm jumping right out in front of him. So I stood out in the middle of the road, start waving my arms. And he stopped and jumped out. And he had a gun.

He goes, you're OK. He said, I'm a military cop. He said, I just got off of duty. I said, a guy, one of my friends just took me out here and tried to murder me. He's out there still looking for me. He goes, where's he at? I said, he's down the dump road there. He's down there driving around looking murder me. He's out there still looking for me. He goes, where's he at? I said, he's down the dump road there. He's down there driving around looking for me.

And he said, well, you're all right now. He said, you're under my protection. Albert was rushed to the hospital with a near-fatal bullet wound in his stomach. The military police caught Ty an hour later, still looking for Albert in his car. The bullet went into seven pieces, so it pretty well shredded up my small and large intestines.

And I had a nine-hour surgery from that one, and then I was in intensive care for about a week and a half. Albert received an honorable medical discharge from the Army. Kenneth Ty was convicted of assault with a dangerous weapon and sentenced to four years in prison. I have nightmares about it to this day. I have nightmares that this guy's chasing me through the woods. That's why I can't even sleep in bed with my wife or my baby because I kick and punch in my sleep. I think I survived because of the will to live. I wasn't ready to go yet. And I believe the Lord was agreed on me that I wasn't ready to go and he didn't want me to come yet.

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very near vertical. Amazing country. Matt had his dog with him for company. They were on a high ridge 6,000 feet above sea level. All the way, you're taking extreme care, always being really conscious of where you're putting your feet and whether you've got a good solid hold or not. And I was just sidling around the next peak in the chain, ready to descend back to the valley to camp for the night.

I stood on a loose slab of rock, which took off down the slope with me on it. Found myself sliding down this grassy slope on my back and slowly coming to the realization that there was a bluff coming and I wasn't gonna stop I was gonna go over it. I thought well this is it I'm going over that bluff I'm not gonna be alive when I hit the bottom of that. Matt went sliding over the cliff. He fell 30 feet onto jagged rocks and landed on his back. I hit the bottom and I'm very surprised to still be alive and conscious.

I try and lift myself up. One wrist gives in, collapses on me and realize, oh, that's not good. And then the same with the legs. I try and stand and my left leg, the ankle buckles under me. Doesn't support my weight at all. Realized fairly quickly that quite likely them both or Eva are broken. Matt was not due out of the mountains for another week. I noticed that there's blood all over the rocks down below me.

The rocks are turning red, and the creek is beginning to go red and misty as well. There must be a huge amount of blood pouring out of me somewhere, and from an injury I haven't even found yet. So obviously I start looking to find out where this injury is and find on the back of my left thigh a big long gash. I can't see it, but I get my fingers into it and it goes up to the second knuckle.

And that's when I worry. That's when I think, well, if that's an artery, if I've hit an artery here, I've not got many minutes left of consciousness. The advice you're given comes to mind. You know, you stop the bleeding, you get pressure onto it, compress the wound, and as long as it isn't an artery, it'll stop, and so I grab some thermals,

some warm clothing out of my pack, make them into a little wad and press them onto the wound, keep the pressure on, and sure enough, within ten minutes, the bleeding stopped. The dog was down there, down there at the bottom of the cliff. I don't know how she got down. She obviously found her own way. She was keeping a good distance from me. I think she was quite frightened by the whole event. I think she realized something wasn't right. I carry a radio locator beacon whenever I go

into the backcountry and at the press of a button and via satellite it alerts the authorities that you're in trouble. It lives in a survival kit at the bottom of my pack, so I have to pull everything out. I get down to the bottom, find the survival kit okay, but there's no locator beacon in there. I'm rooting through, looking at all the other things in my pack, thinking it's got to be here, and slowly, slowly come to the realization that there's no locator beacon.

Before leaving, Matt had told colleagues to raise the alarm if he hadn't returned in 10 days. That deadline was not for another week. There's very likely to be a frost this night. There certainly have been on the other nights so far on the walk. And I've got to get myself so I can keep warm and survive. About 20 yards away from where I'm lying, there's a weird little platform,

grassy platform at the base of a cliff. And I figure if I get there, and I can get a tent up there, then I'm going to be in the best possible position that I can be to survive. Matt dragged himself down the mountainside to a ledge beside a creek. My sleeping bag, unfortunately, had fallen out of my pack into the creek at this stage, so I had to rescue that from the creek and drag it off to where I was going. I was shattered. I was absolutely exhausted. Night was fast approaching. Matt managed to pitch a tent, but his sleeping bag was still soaking wet. I was using the dog just as a hot water bottle, just curled up around her. So it was just me and the dog and all my clothes

curled up in the tent. I was very, very grateful for that dog that night. The temperature plummeted below freezing during the night. The next morning, Matt woke up to searing pain in his wounded leg. My big fear is if these wounds become infected, I could potentially lose the leg.

I carry salt with me for food, and that was the obvious thing to use to disinfect the wound. So I was soaking a rag in water and dissolving as much salt on it as I can and just pressing that against the wound, keeping the wounds clean that way. Hunters and climbers were being flown into nearby mountain ranges. I can hear fixed-wing aircraft flying up and down the valley,

taking hunters in and out. I've got a big orange sheet of plastic spread out. Every time a plane comes over, I'm waving and waving. But they're just so far away, they're not going to see me. I always carry plenty of spare food, but it never really occurred to me to carry extra gas. It was always the assumption, if there would be wood around, I can make a fire,

but up in the high country where I am, I can't do that. So I cook every second day, cook enough for two days' worth of food. I'm living basically on rice. I've got rice, dehydrated vegetables, a few packets of soups. I've got muesli bars as well, but I want to keep those in case I do have to make a move anywhere. That would be good energy for walking. I only took enough food for the dog for the planned trip,

which I'll put her on half rations when the accident happened to try and stretch these out a wee bit. The pain's worse at night when there's no distraction around, lying there trying to drop off to sleep with this ache, certainly in my ankle, trying to find a comfortable position to lie. I can't lie on my back because of the lacerations to my buttock and thigh.

But lying on my front twists my ankle over to one side or the other. So trying to get in a comfortable position isn't easy. But thankfully I've got this little AM radio with me and I can pick up the radio stations at night. So there's at least a voice to listen to during the darkness. The weather had stayed fine all week, but Matt knew it wouldn't last. And every day you get the forecast for the next three days, and it's like, oh, good for three more, good for three more.

But finally the news came that there was a strong southwest front coming through on the Thursday night, Friday morning. It was on the Thursday, so six days after the fall, that I actually tried to stand up just to see if I was going to be able to do this. I grabbed hold of a big boulder that was next to where I was camped and lifted myself onto my feet and very nearly passed out for my efforts. I just didn't have the energy. By Thursday night, the storm was brewing. The valley mist is starting to rise up and form clouds around the peak and there's

higher clouds up above as well and it's beginning to look very threatening. And sure enough, by Friday morning, it's absolutely bucketing it down with rain. This rain is feeding this little creek that's like next to me. It's absolutely pounding down the mountainside. You can hear rocks being washed down. It's quite a frightening experience. The rain had stopped by Friday. Matt was due out by this time, and he expected the alarm

to have been raised. I'm thinking, well, search and rescue should be on the way. I should be hearing choppers in the next day or two. But two more days pass, and we're up to day nine after the accident, and there's still no sign of anyone looking for me. It began to occur to me that something had gone wrong, gone wrong with my intentions that I'd left

and that rescue hadn't been called for some reason or another and that maybe I ought to start thinking about getting myself out of here. There's still no sign of anyone looking for me. Coincidentally, at this time, I'm on to my last half kilo of rice. I can see a hut down in the valley, the Horace Walker Hut. Currently at this time, I'm onto my last half kilo a gram of rice. I can see a hut down in the valley of the Horace Walker hut. Every day, the sun's shining off its roof.

There will be extra food there. There'll be warmth. There'll be a fire. There might even be people. But in the state I'm in, it's probably two days to get there. There's what we call tiger country below, just thick scrub, probably two metres high, and just all intertwined, so you're fighting your way through it, you're squirming your

way underneath, and going through that with broken bones is going to be a mission, but it's what I've got to do. There's no trees, there's nothing I can make a walking stick of except my tent poles. So I take those together. It just gives me that wee bit of support I need to hold off and set off down the mountain. I'd broken my left ankle and broken the right-hand side of it. So as long as I kept my weight towards the left,

to the side of the joint that was still okay, there wasn't too much pain. But if I accidentally put my weight the other way, it was, it was agony. It took Matt a day to hobble down through the sub-alpine grass to the treeline. The next day, he still had over 1,500 feet of dense vegetation to climb through.

The slope gets steeper as you go down, so there's this curve that I can't see over, and I don't really know what I'm dropping towards. While on the way down, there's a whole series of creeks flowing down through this scrub, so I stick to those where possible, but they keep falling off down, there's a whole series of creeks flowing down through this scrub, so I stick to those where possible. They keep falling off down, dropping off down waterfalls, and so then I have to climb out,

climb back into the scrub and bash my way over to the next one. Matt spent all day fighting his way through the tangled scrub. The leg from the knee down is black and purple from all the bruising from the injury and from the bone moving around in ways that it shouldn't. And the wrist, it's got a dog's leg in it. My fingers kept going numb and cold so I kept having to extend and rearrange all the broken section of my wrist to keep the circulation going. After about four or five hours of fighting my way through the stuff I finally get into Fuchsia Forest, where it's big and open and clean underneath, and it's actually quite good going for the last 200 metres. The slope has got

steeper and steeper as we've gone down, and the last 20 metres are almost vertical. I'm literally climbing down Fuchsia trees, trying to hook my broken arm, because I can't hold on with the hand, obviously, over branches and lower myself down. Matt finally reached the valley floor. The river was flooded from the storm two days before. It's about 10 metres wide, it's probably over a metre deep, and it's just tumbling over the boulders there. There's a huge amount of force on quite a steep riverbed,

and there's no way that I'm going to be able to get across that with a broken leg. I head off downriver, hopefully looking for a nice still bit of water that I can swim. Find, as it turns out, a really good pool. But there's a two-metre waterfall at its head. And I don't really fancy launching myself off a two-metre high waterfall in the condition I'm in. And so I turn around, head upriver. Matt hobbled three miles up the river. I've got bruising all up my leg from the broken bones. My knees have been taking

a bashing from trying to support my walking in an unnatural way all the way down this mountainside. And I come to a big, long, straight stretch where the water is still fast flowing, but it's not white water, it's not tumbling over rocks. And so I decide that this is the place to swim the river. If you go five kilometres up river, this isn't water, it's ice. And the water is absolutely freezing. And I'm carrying all these injuries and all the muscles just seize as I go through that river. As Matt swam the icy river, his dog hesitated on the bank. About halfway across, the dog, who's been running up

and down the bank up to this stage, panicking, she doesn't like swimming rivers like this, obviously, launches in and decides she's going to hitch a ride and tries to scramble onto my back as I'm trying to swim this river. And we have a few words, as you can imagine. I get to the other side, and I cannot stand. and she decides she's going to hitch a ride and tries to scramble onto my back as I'm trying to swim this river. We have a few words, as you can imagine. I get to the other side and I cannot stand and I can hardly walk.

So it takes a lot of effort just to warm all the muscles up and get going again. Matt still had two more miles to walk to get to a hunter's hut. Soon after I get out the river, though, I actually spot footprints and boot marks heading up the valley. We've had this huge rainfall through two days ago. And those boot prints wouldn't have survived it. So this means somebody was here within the last two days. I come around the last corner, and I can see the hut there

across this small flat. There, coming out the hut door, there's a hunter. He's carrying a water bucket, and it's the best sight I could ever see. I'm not going to have to walk four more days to get out of this valley. I've just got to get to that hut, and they can walk out, they can get rescue,

and I'm getting out of here. He yells a greeting, how's it going? And I say, oh, I had better. And he looks at... He obviously sees that I'm hobbling here, that I'm using a walking stick. He says, oh, you sprained your ankle. And I say, I think it might be a wee bit worse than that. As I get closer, I think he begins to realise

the seriousness of my injuries, because he comes over and he's trying to take my pack off me, he's trying to help me support my weight. But I've just walked two days from the site of my injury to get to this hut. I'm not going to let anyone carry me for the last 100 metres. The determination just to see the job through is there. We get down to the hut and the dogs had four days without any dog food at all. The hunters bring out a tin of baked beans and open it up and it's gone within seconds.

It's absolutely ravenous, the poor thing. It took one of the hunters all of the next day to walk out of the valley and get help. The following morning, a helicopter arrived at first light to pick up Matt and his dog. Matt was taken straight to the hospital. They look at my wrist and realize that the top half of the wrist has blown out. The inside of the ankle that should hold the bone is disintegrated. On the wrist, they can't even find enough bone to make it heal with, so they have to take a graft from elsewhere

and put plates in both the wrist and the ankle to help it heal. Matt recovered almost fully from his injuries. He and his dog still love hiking in the mountains. This whole incident gave me perspective. It made me realize what was important in life and what wasn't and gave, really gave me the drive to take control and actually choose the direction that my life was going to take and not merely go where life took me. I survived because I was prepared because I had everything with me, and that I needed to survive an extended stay up in the mountains.

And also, I think, because it never occurred to me that I was not going to get through this. I had that determination always to take the next step and do what was required to get myself out of there. This episode of I Survived is brought to you by Huggies Skin Essentials. Having a baby comes with so many unexpected challenges, but diaper rash shouldn't be one of them. For me, there was nothing worse than seeing my little one with an uncomfortable diaper rash. It makes everything harder from bath time to diaper changes and left me feeling totally helpless. But now baby butts can rejoice because new Huggies

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It's January 1999 in Manassas, Virginia. Christy is 14 years old and in middle school. I was in eighth grade and I just went to school, didn't care for it much. Wasn't my thing, but you have to do it. I was very shy. Stacy was my older sister. She's two years older than me. She was my rock.

She's who I leaned on. Stacy had a friend named Paul, who was two years older than her. He had been in and out of jail for theft and drug offenses. Paul always wore black. Like, he just, he always wore black, and he was scrunchy looking, and he was always

playing with a knife. I knew I didn't like him. I had just come home from school, and Paul and Stacy were in the house. Stacy was downstairs doing laundry. And I went to my bedroom, and she told me she had to go to work that day. And I said, OK. So apparently she left.

Paul was pacing up and down the hallway. And he kind of stopped and looked in my room when I was putting on my hair. And I asked him, will Stacy go to work? And he said, yeah. So I'm like, OK, so why are you still here? Because I don't like you and we never hang out. So I actually called my mom and told her that one of Stacy's friends is here and he's not leaving. And she told me to tell him to leave. So I

told him to leave and he didn't say anything. He just left. The next day, Christy got home from school at 3.15 p.m. I go to open the door and it's locked. So I'm like, okay, got home from school at 3.15 p.m. I go to open the door, and it's locked. So I'm like, okay, I figured Stacy went to work. So I set my stuff down on the table and get my keys out, and as soon as I put the key in the door, Paul opens the door for me. And I was kind of stunned, thinking, you know, why is the door locked and why is he in my house? I asked him, where's Stacy?

And he was like, she's in her room. I go to walk in the house, and he walks behind me. Paul followed Christy down the hallway to her bedroom. I'm standing in front of my door looking into her room, and I don't see her there. And then I turn to go in my room, and my sister is laying on the floor inside my bedroom. She's laying on her back right there in my doorway.

And I saw a pull of blood. I didn't know she was dead for sure, but I just knew in my heart that she wasn't with us anymore. 20-year-old Paul had stabbed Stacey to death. I didn't know what to do. I didn't know what to do. I didn't think I could move. I was just stunned. Every emotion ran through me.

I lost my sister and my best friend. And it overwhelmed me. I just started bawling. I didn't know what to do. The way Stacey was, she never backed down from anybody. If you said anything about her family or did anything wrong to her, she stood up for herself. And I knew Stacey had fought back, and that's why she died.

So I knew not to fight back, or he was going to kill me. Paul forced Christy downstairs to the basement. I kept telling him as we're walking down the basement steps, please don't kill me. Just, you know, I'm begging to him, crying, don't kill me. So we get down to the basement, which half of it is my parents' room. And then the other half is like my stepdad's workshop and where you do laundry and everything. And he told me to go in there. And so I did.

He didn't say one more until we got down there, and that was get undressed. He told me to take my clothes off, and I did. And then he told me to lay down on the floor, and then he raped me. When he was raping me, there was a knock at the door. And so he heard the knock. He got up and got dressed, tied me up before he went upstairs.

He tied my hands behind my back and my feet together in front of me. And then he went upstairs. He tied my hands behind my back and my feet together in front of me. And then he went upstairs. I was just sitting there, like, curled up on the floor with my arms over me, shaking, crying. It took me a minute to realize, like, who was knocking on the door, and then I remembered I invited my friend over. And the relief was there because he stopped.

But then I was scared for him, for my friend, because I thought something could happen to him too. I got my hands free from behind my back, and I tried. There was a back door that you could actually go out of, and then the steps were hollow. And I didn't think I could run because my feet were tied together, so I figured I would at least try to hide under the steps. Christy began dragging herself towards the back door. Her friend gave up knocking and left before the killer got to the front door. I heard him coming back down. So I scooted back

into the position I was in and put my hands back behind my back. And I just kept thinking, what is he going to do now? And when he came back downstairs, he took my glasses off. And then the next thing I knew, I was being strangled from behind. He used some kind of string. I don't know where he got it from. He just pulled it as hard as he could around my neck. I couldn't yell. I couldn't scream. He was cutting off my windpipe.

I just got my hands free, and I fell onto my stomach. And he put his knee on my back. And I started trying to pull at the string string or whatever he was strangling me with, trying to get air into my lungs, and eventually I just passed out. While Christy was unconscious, her assailant stabbed her in the stomach. He then cut her throat. I woke up on my back. I know my feet were still tied together.

I couldn't move them. I really couldn't feel my body. Knowing that Stacy was gone, I just felt she was sitting right there with me holding my hand. I just felt peace, but at the same time, I was scared that he was still in the house. I kept thinking to myself, he's still in here. He is still in here, and he's going

to see that I'm awake and come back and kill me. Maybe five minutes after I woke up, I heard my stepdad pull up. And I'm, you know, thinking he's still in the house, and now he's going to kill my stepdad. So my stepdad's, like, walking back and forth in the house. And I notice he goes out and checks the mail because he usually did. And then I heard him because you can hear everything from the basement. I heard him walking down the hallway. All I heard was, oh, shit.

And I knew he found Stacy. Stacy was lying in a pool of blood in Christy's bedroom. I guess he couldn't find the phone, so he started paging it. And it was actually down there with me on top of the washing machine. So, you know, I kept waiting for him to hear it. I felt if I tried to make noise, then Paul, if he's still in the house, is going to know I'm awake and breathing.

And I feel he's going to come back and kill me. And he kept paging it and paging it. And finally, I guess he did hear it because he came down to where I was. He was frantic. I couldn't look at him because I really couldn't turn my head. I couldn't see him anyways because I wasn't wearing my glasses.

But you can just hear how nervous he was, how scared he was. Unknown to Christy, the killer had left the house. Christy's stepfather found the phone and called 911. I was starting to go into shock. I was getting real cold. And he kept telling me everything's going to be okay. And then the paramedics came and wrapped me up, put me on a gurney, and took me out of there. Christy was in intensive care for three days in an induced coma. The killer, Paul Powell, was arrested the following day.

The detective who interviewed him said that he planned to kill the whole family, steal my mom's truck, go down to South Carolina and kill someone who stole his clothes two years before. But he got scared after he did me, so he left. Paul Powell was convicted of capital murder, abduction, and rape. He was executed by electrocution on March 18, 2010, 11 years after taking Stacey's life. She had all these plans and dreams that she wanted to do, but yet her life got taken, and I have nothing. I didn't know what I wanted to do with life,

and yet my life got spared. I survived because of the grace of God. He wanted me here for a reason. I just got to find it.