Exclusive: Bronx sex assault victim speaks out about attack

BRONX (WABC) -- Police are searching for a violent sexual predator who attacked a 17-year-old girl in the Bronx, and they're hoping that surveillance video that captured the incident last week will lead to an arrest.

It happened Monday, September 8, on Jerome Avenue at East 183rd Street in the University Heights section.

Now, the victim is speaking out exclusively to Eyewitness News.

She says that not only was she sexually assaulted, but the suspect threatened to kill her family if she said anything about what happened to her.

She thinks the man is watching her because it is not the first time he has approached her on the street, and she says she is so scared that she is now in hiding.

She had just left work at a restaurant after 4 a.m. and was trying to hail a cab when she says a man in a yellow shirt approached her.

"'Why were you late to work today?'", she says he asked her.

It was an odd question posed by a total stranger. What's more bizarre is what police say he did to her.

She says she tried to get away, but he pulled her away, threw her on the ground and choked her until she lost consciousness.

When she woke up, she realized he had bitten her in the pelvic area.

"He said he was going to kill me and my familia when he was choking me. Then I fell on the ground," she said in Spanish. "When he was choking me I just got the feeling that he hates women."

She says he didn't have a gun or a knife, and admits she had been drinking. "The only thing I remember is, when he was choking me I was saying please don't choke me, because I couldn't breathe," she said.

It's a face she says she has seen before. Five days prior to the assault, she says he approached her on the street with more questions.

"I was walking and he asked me, 'do you work in this restaurant'? 'I said, yes I do'", she said.

The suspect is described as a dark-skinned Hispanic male, approximately 25 years of age, standing 5-foot-6 and weighing 150 pounds. He was last seen wearing a white Adidas hat, yellow Aeropostale shirt and blue jeans.

Anyone with information in regards to this incident is asked to call Crime stoppers at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477).