Stranger Risks Her Life To Help Woman Escape Ax-Wielding Attacker Chasing Her

A heroic stranger swooped in to save a woman who was running for her life when a man spontaneously started chasing her with a hatchet.

Like a real-life horror movie

It was still dark outside when Gina Hopkins-Calligan noticed she was being chased by a man with an ax. And according to a police report, she did nothing to provoke him.

“He was just screaming. He was galloping at me with the ax, like this just ready to chop me to pieces, he looked determined to kill me,” Hopkins-Calligan told Fox 10. “I was just screaming, waving my arms. I probably looked like a crazy person.”

Panicked, Hopkins-Calligan tried to wave down drivers to stop and help her. Fortunately, one did.

“She said something to me, and turned on this street and let me into her car,” said Hopkins-Calligan.

Stranger to the rescue

The driver that stopped was identified as Emily Regester and she was on her way to class when she noticed the jogger running for her life.

“I saw an altercation. It was dark, so I wanted to make sure she was OK, so I turned right here and met her, asked if she was OK,” Regester told Fox 10. “She said no. So she got in the car, and we called 911.”

Hopkins-Calligan said she credits Regester for the rescue, but the driver disagreed. “She absolutely saved herself, I would say,” said Regester. “She’s a very fast runner.”

Hopkins-Calligan wonders if she would have been able to survive if she wasn’t able to run so fast.

“It’s scary to think what if that were not me? What if that were an elderly person who could not run away from him?”

Gina Hopkins-Calligan

As for the ax-wielding suspect, police identified him as 25-year-old Joshua Eicher and said he was still in the area with the hatchet when they picked him up. He’s currently in jail facing a felony count of assault with a deadly weapon.