TACOMA, Wash. — A Tacoma woman says she may not have survived a brutal attack had it not been for her three young children.
She says they are the reason she fought back against a man stabbing her in the chest with a pair of scissors.
Jessica Hunter’s alleged attacker, Steven Corona, is in the Pierce County Jail on assault charges.
He was Jessica Hunter’s housemate, to whom she decided to rent when he needed a hand up. Corona was her friend, her kids’ babysitter, then suddenly-- —early Saturday morning while Jessica and her two sons and daughter slept in Jessica’s bed—she says he was her attacker.
“That was the only thing that I thought about: not dying, so that nothing happened to them,” Jessica told us.
Jessica says she woke up with Corona on top of her, naked, twisting a pair of scissors into her chest while the kids huddled in the corner.
She managed to get him on the floor and got her knee on his throat, then called 911.
“The dispatch told me to lower the children out the window if I could and so, it’s only a one-story house, so I was able to start lowering my children out the window,” she explained.
Meanwhile, Jessica says, Corona ran to his room, got dressed, and grabbed a backpack full of his belongings.
Before he even got to the street, police intercepted and arrested him.
According to court documents, Corona told police he didn’t know what happened and asked if he had attacked any kids.
Monday he had a bail hearing in Pierce County court.
Jessica went for herself, but more importantly, for her kids.
“I explained to the judge that I was scared for me, and my children’s safety, and that I was requesting a higher bail or no bail at all.”
Bail was set at $100,000, lower than both she and the prosecutor had asked for.
Jessica would like to see Corona face additional charges like indecent exposure, since he was naked in front of her children.
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