What would you do if your life depended on the help of a stranger?
Oftentimes, you’ll find that you aren’t left with a lot of options when your life is on the line. Let’s hope that it doesn’t happen often, or at all. But if it does, would you put your trust into a stranger?
It’s hard to say if you’ve yet to find yourself in such a predicament. But life is unpredictable and you never know what you’re capable of doing until it’s down to the wire.
Two women were just about to find out what putting your trust into a stranger meant one sunny day in Waterford, California.
For cashier, Savannah Pritchett, it was just another day at the Triple R Gas and Mart at which she worked. But it all changed when a young woman walked into the store.
Pritchett says that she looked normal and everything seemed fine until the woman grabbed her arm and quietly asked for her help.
“When she grabbed me, she was very, very shaky and I kinda, you know, she was like, ‘please, please help me.'”
The woman confided in Pritchett that she had been kidnapped in Fresno on Tuesday and sexually assaulted overnight. She continued that her captors were planning on taking her to San Francisco. She also told Pritchett that they had guns and would likely use them.
“I saw in her eyes and how bad she was shaking that, oh no, she was scared,” Pritchett said.
Pritchett had to think fast. She led the woman to the restrooms at the back of the store. There, she lent the woman her cellphone to call 911.
Pritchett shared her thoughts, “So I just thought, the bathroom, I could stick her in there. And it’s not up here, it’s far enough back where you’re safe.”
Pritchett knew that if she locked the door, the suspects would know that something was astray and possibly flee. She didn’t want to risk the chance of them getting away. Therefore, when they came in, she acted as if everything was normal.
Of course, the men began looking for the woman. Again, Pritchett was quick to act. She told them the woman was in the bathroom tending to her menstrual cycle.
“Because she did tell me that she was sexually assaulted from the guys, so I kinda thought, well, hey I can put sexually assaulted and bleeding together and I bet they probably wouldn’t get that. I felt that would just fly over their head(s).”
It did. The guys stuck around waiting for the woman to come out. When Pritchett saw the police approaching, she left the store. That’s when they entered, guns drawn, and arrested the suspects.
They arrested 18-year-old Anthony Sandoval and two other 16-year-old suspects as well. A total of four suspects were arrested. And just as the victim said, there was a gun found on one of the suspects in the store and another in their vehicle.
Fortunately, the woman was safe, all thanks to Pritchett’s quick thinking and willingness to help.
It isn’t lost on Sgt. Tom Letras from the Stanislaus County Sheriff’s Department just how much she meant to saving the woman’s wife and potentially other future victims.
“Her being able to get this victim into a secured restroom with a phone and being able to contact law enforcement very well may have saved her life.”
But Pritchett modestly rejects the praises, “Hero? No,” she says with a laugh.
But many, rightfully, would beg to differ.
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