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Lauren Murrey believes she was confronted by the same man who attacked another runner near the UMW track. |
When Lauren Murrey checked her student e-mail July 10 and learned that a young woman had been attacked while running near the track at Mary Washington University, she was frightened.
The rising senior flashed back to nine days earlier, when she had been caught off guard by a man who lunged at her while she was running on nearby Hanover Street.
"He just jumped up from the gravel and looked at me really aggressively," Murrey said.
The 21-year-old psychology major said she ran to a friend's house nearby, but no one was home. She then headed for the Sunken Well Tavern, where she works as a waitress.
A co-worker called the police, and Murrey sat--speechless, sweaty and scared--until the officer came to take her statement.
Murrey said she was admittedly "out of it" when the officer came in because she felt that the man intended to hurt her, but she tried to answer the officer's questions.
Murrey said she didn't feel that she was taken seriously, and that police incorrectly described her actions in later news reports about the attack on the jogger. She contacted The Free Lance-Star last week to set the record straight.
"I felt like he thought I was just another blond girl running down the street," she said of the officer who responded to the call. "I felt like he was just so nonchalant."
A police report of Murrey's incident was never made. Fredericksburg Police Department spokeswoman Natatia Bledsoe said that's because no crime was committed. Murrey was not physically harmed.
Murrey said she understands that, but she wants the public to know that she did talk to police about the incident.
a warning to runners
After the other woman was attacked July 10, Murrey went back to police to tell them she believed that suspect may be the man who frightened her.
The report that he was 6-foot-2 triggered something because she remembered the man as being tall, she said.
Based on information from police, The Free Lance-Star incorrectly reported that Murrey hadn't told police about her incident until after the July 10 attack.
Bledsoe said that when she gave the newspaper that information, the timing was unclear because there was no police report on the earlier incident.
Murrey said she wants people to know she did report the incident immediately. She said she hoped that getting the information out there would make other runners aware.
"Now I run with a buddy or with a dog," she said. "And my mom bought me Mace and running supplies."
Murrey said she is more cautious, and she recommends that other runners, especially women, be careful, too.
"I'm from Baltimore. You would think this [city] would feel safer, but it doesn't," she said.
ROBBED ON HANOVER
The running incident was not Murrey's only scare on Hanover Street. She and two friends were robbed at gunpoint there when she was a freshman.
"They took a Coach wallet and some money and our cell phones," she said about the 2005 holdup, which occurred a couple of blocks from the running incident.
Murrey said that although the assailants in the robbery had a gun, she was more frightened by the confrontation when she was running.
"I was alone and it caught me by surprise," she said of the more recent incident.
The car full of people who robbed Murrey and the two students she was with that night--another female and a male--were prosecuted after using one the students' credit cards at 7-Eleven.
Murrey said she's starting to get over her fears, but is still extra-cautious.
"I had nightmares and couldn't sleep," she said. "But I've seen doctors for the sleeping problem, and I'm back on a normal routine."
Ellen Biltz: 540/374-5424
Email: ebiltz@freelancestar.com
