HIALEAH, Fla. — A 21-year-old man armed with a knife attacked a woman and tried to rape her in an apartment complex’s shared laundry room in Hialeah, according to police.
A resident responded to the woman’s cries for help shortly before 2:40 a.m. on Dec. 9, and saw Luis Rodas holding a knife to her torso, according to police.
“I was coming late at night from work,” said Andy Plaza, who helped the victim.
Rodas had pinned the woman against a washing machine, and after the resident confronted him, he let her go and took off running through the parking lot, according to police.
The victim spoke to Local 10 News about the harrowing incident.
“It was an attack physically by a young man with a knife. He held his hand over my mouth,” she said. “I’m scared to leave my home. I’m always locking everything, I’m checking my doors, I check the bathroom, behind the curtain to make sure nobody’s there. I’m terrified.”
The victim’s family was grateful for Plaza’s decision to respond to her cries for help.
“I would have done the same thing for anybody. I am a father, I am a neighbor, I am a human being with a heart,” Plaza said.
Detectives reported finding surveillance video and used an image to identify Rodas, who was born in Honduras and lives in Hialeah with his mother and two brothers, according to police.
On Sunday, after undercover surveillance. police officers detained one of Rodas’s brothers and arrested him in an apartment in a building along West Okeechobee Road, near Red Road, according to a police report.
Corrections booked Rodas, also known as Luis Antonio Rodas Martinez, on Sunday night at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center, inmate records show.
Rodas appeared in court on Monday morning, and Miami-Dade County Circuit Judge Mindy Glazer denied him bond and ordered him to stay away from the victim and the apartment building.
Rodas faced charges of attempted sexual battery with serious personal injury and armed aggravated battery and kidnapping.
Local 10 News Assignment Editor Carson Merlo contributed to this report.
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