Update

KNYSNA NEWS - The 42-year-old woman who was stabbed in the arm, back and chest by an assailant in her home in Rawson Street, Knysna, this past weekend, says the way she was treated by staff at Knysna Provincial Hospital and an ambulance driver and his assistant, made her feel as if she "was going from one nightmare to another".

Collapsed in street

In what the victim's mother called "an act of bravery", the bleeding woman managed to escape from her attacker while he was rummaging through her home.

She collapsed in Rawson Street while desperately trying to find someone to help her.

Patrolling security guards came across her and phoned the provincial ambulance service and the police. An ambulance arrived and took her to Knysna Provincial Hospital, where, she said, she went through another traumatic ordeal.

'Entered through window'

Her mother, who lives in Queen Street, said her daughter was painting kitchen shelves on the lower floor of her two-storey home at about 00:23 on Saturday 26 April.

After finishing the work, her daughter opened a trellis door and went outside into a courtyard where she cleaned her paintbrushes.

"[The assailant] had climbed onto the roof from the road, and gone in [to the home] through an upstairs bathroom window. He must have come downstairs when she was outside washing the brushes," the victim's mother said.

"He then quickly took the gap and went into her [downstairs] bathroom. And then [after her daughter came inside] she went into the bathroom to run a bath."

Serrated knife

The mother said her daughter found the intruder sitting on the toilet seat.

"She screamed when she saw him, and tried to back out of the bathroom, but he grabbed her and stabbed her with a serrated knife above the breastbone; that was a bad one [wound], a deep one.

"Then he stabbed her under her arm, and in her back, but it [the knife] did not puncture her lung; and then he stabbed her in the arm. 

"Then he told her, 'I'm going to kill you if you move'". He wanted to know if there was anyone else in the house. She lied and said her son and daughter were there, but they were not.

"He wanted to know where the valuables were, and she said, 'Up the stairs in my bedroom'. He then gave her the remote control for the TV, and told her to turn the volume up loud, so the children she claimed were there would not be disturbed."

'Locked assailant inside'

The assailant then went up the stairs in search of goods, leaving her badly injured daughter in the downstairs lounge.

"She saw the trellis door keys on a coffee table, and very bravely, she opened the door, got out, and slam-locked it [the door], leaving him trapped in the house.

"She's surrounded by neighbours, but no one responded to her screams."

A young man lives in a building on the grounds of her daughter's home, and she "bashed on his door and he came out".

Her daughter's phone [which the robber ended up stealing] had been in the house, and the tenant did not have one, so her daughter was unable to phone for help.

Guards to the rescue

"So they [her daughter and the tenant] went into the road, to try and flag down somebody, and she collapsed in the road," the mother said.

Security guards from Allsound Security drove past them in a patrol vehicle, and then turned around to come to their assistance. One of the guards contacted the provincial ambulance service and the police.

"They [guards] were extremely helpful," the victim's mother said. An ambulance duly arrived and took her daughter, who does not have medical aid, to the Knysna Provincial Hospital.

"Now when you arrive [at a hospital, in the condition her daughter was in] you are taken to casualty. They [the male ambulance driver and a female assistant] told her to get out of the ambulance by herself and walk into the hospital through the main entrance."

'Mocked her'

The mother said the ambulance driver and assistant mocked her daughter for being in socks, without shoes. Her daughter had taken her shoes off before she went to run a bath.

While the mother spoke to Knysna-Plett Herald, the victim, seemingly still in shock, listened in the background, providing her mother with information on the terrible turn of events.

Then the victim herself started recounting her experience at the hospital, saying she was not taken to the casualty section.

"I was given a slip and told to sit down with the rest of the people in a queue. They [hospital staff] were in no rush to see me [give her treatment]," she said.

Tetanus injection

After a long wait she was given a tetanus injection and told to wait to get stitches. She said it felt as if she had been singled out for bad treatment.

"It was horrendous and cold. It was going from one nightmare to another. When you think you are in safe hands, and you find out you are not, it's a terrible feeling.

"I don't wish it on anyone who's gone through such trauma to go through trauma at a hospital again," she said.

Worried about the severity of her chest wound, and concerned about the way she was being dealt with, she decided to leave the hospital.

"I went out and that's when my mother-in-law and ex-husband arrived at the hospital," she said.

The two went back into the hospital with the victim, and the victim's mother-in-law and ex-husband were told by a man in a paramedic uniform that the victim had not been brought to the hospital by ambulance, as if suggesting that she did not require emergency assistance. However, a security guard countered this, saying she had in fact arrived there in an ambulance.

Taken to another hospital

The family members then took the victim to her mother's home, where she was given painkillers, and her mother took her to Life Knysna Private Hospital.

Here she was X-rayed and it was determined, she said, that "the stab wound in my chest, which was quite deep, didn't go into my chest cavity. Thankfully, I was in the clear".

Her wounds were stapled closed, and she was given strong painkillers and anti-anxiety medication.

Health Department approached for comment

The provincial health department has been asked to comment on the allegations against the staff at Knysna Provincial Hospital, and against the provincial ambulance staff. When a response is received, it will be published.

Police ask for information

Southern Cape police spokesperson Sergeant Chris Spies said the assailant, who is still at large, took the victim's Hi-Tech bomber jacket, black Samsung cellphone with a red rubber cover and an undisclosed amount of cash.

Spies said the investigating officer, Sergeant Joslyn Williams of the Knysna detectives, urges anyone with information that could lead to the arrest of the assailant to contact her on 044 302 6608. Information can also be provided to Crime Stop on 08600 10111.

Spies said all information will be treated with the utmost confidentiality.

* The victim and her mother did not want to be named.

Read previous article:

Woman stabbed, robbed in her Knysna home | Knysna-Plett Herald 

‘We bring you the latest Garden Route, Hessequa, Karoo news’