Trishia was waiting at the bus stop in front of the Auto Zone on Powell, near 82nd, in Southeast Portland on Tuesday morning March 31, at the beginning of the third week of the Cordova virus lockdown.
I ran into her at the 7-11 not far from where the story she related to me happened. A large black man, standing some fix and a half feet tall, pulled up in a Mercedes and asked her if she needed a ride.
She declined.
He then had some more questions for her which I cannot altogether remember. She told me that he was very insistent that she should get in his car and go with him and do what he wanted. She said, based on the experience of other girls her age who she knew, that she believed this was an attempt to acquire her as a prostitute, that the man was a pimp or aspired to that status.
“I can pretty much guarantee you that this guy would have shot me up on heroin, took my I.D., pimped me out and if I didn’t do what he wanted I’d end up just another junky overdose. These guys do this to women around here all the time.”
The man then got out of his car and approached her, making to put hands on her shoulders to guide her into the car, in broad daylight, in front of a handful of Auto Zone employees and she took action, backing away, “And I drew my knife and said, ‘back off.’”
He told me to put the knife away that someone could get hurt and I told him, “I will stab you if you put your hands on me!”
“This guy had accused me of being a hooker when I was waiting for the bus to go buy a car—I am so glad I won’t be on foot now. I would have stabbed him. I also know that I don’t want to stab anyone. I’m so lucky he backed off because I figure those guys in the Auto Zone would have definitely called the cops on me.”
