North Texas woman stabbed by stranger as she took out trash is recovering, son says
Stephen Denney’s mother was taking her trash bins to the curb Monday evening when a man she had never met before started walking toward her from behind.
She didn’t know it at the time, but this man — an 18-year-old University of Texas at Arlington student named Guadalupe Buenaventura — had already approached two other homeowners in Lewisville, according to police. And he had a knife.
Buenaventura asked the 56-year-old woman if she had seen his little girl and began backing her into a corner, which made her feel uneasy, according to Denney, who has spoken with his mother as well as reviewed security footage of the attack. As she tried to move away from him, she told him no, she hadn’t seen his girl, Denney said. He responded by jabbing at her a few times with the blade, hitting her once.
She kicked at the man in self-defense, Denney said, and he took off running down the street.
She didn’t know she was stabbed until she walked inside her home on Winston Drive, making sure to lock the door behind her, and described the attack to her husband, Denney said. He lifted up her shirt and saw a wound roughly the size of a half-dollar above her belly button.
They waited on their front steps for the ambulance to take her to the hospital, where she underwent surgery.
“The blade hit one of her major arteries as well as her liver,” Denney told the Star-Telegram on the way to visit his mother in the hospital Wednesday. “Her blood pressure a few times during the surgery dropped significantly. She came pretty close to it being really bad.”
Denney, a 31-year-old Frisco resident, had been on the way to the gym Monday around 6:15 p.m. when his father called him to say his mother was stabbed and he should head to the hospital. When he got to her room, she was happy to see him. She wasn’t angry with the attacker, he said, and was far more concerned that someone was watching her two cats.
She’s the type of person who would’ve given Buenaventura a water bottle if he had asked, her son said. The type of person who has an easier time forgiving than holding grudges.
But as she’s been recovering in a hospital ICU, Denney said, she’s been understandably emotional — she’s scared the suspect, who was arrested by Lewisville police Tuesday night, might come back to find her.
She’s wondered why something so bizarre, random and violent happened to her.
“It’s mainly like, ‘Why? Why did this happen to me?’” Denney said. “And then just her talking about how she’s scared — ‘What if he comes after me again?’ Those are the only two emotions that I’ve heard.”
Identifying, arresting the suspect
Buenaventura was being held Wednesday at Lewisville City Jail, in custody less than 48 hours after the attack, according to Lynn O’Donnell, the police public information coordinator. If he doesn’t make bail, he’ll be transported to a Denton County prison.
He’s charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon.
A UTA spokesman on Wednesday confirmed Buenaventura is a current student after enrolling in January.
The 18-year-old wasn’t answering questions from police Wednesday, O’Donnell said.
“He is not speaking to our detectives,” she said. “They tried to speak to him this morning and he would not speak to them.”
She said it took “a lot of teamwork” for police to identify and arrest Buenaventura so quickly, with several different units working on “piecing together this puzzle.”
Denney said his mother played a big role in this process.
After she kicked at the attacker, Denney said, he started to flee and accidentally dropped his cell phone to the ground. She instinctively scooped it up, and when he turned around to get it, he saw her holding it and continued running away, Denney said.
“She just walked up the driveway like nothing even happened. I mean, she wasn’t even running or holding her stomach or nothing,” he said. “But that’s one of the main things that cracked this case so quick is the fact that she was brave enough and she thought, in the moment, ‘Hey, he dropped his phone, I need to grab his phone and take it.’”
Police were able to get into the phone, which was cracked, and ultimately found Buenaventura. Denney said he considers his mother an “absolute hero,” helping to stop this man before he could harm anyone else.
His parents were also able to share two security videos with police — one from their Ring doorbell camera and one from the camera above the garage located in the rear of their house. The videos, pieced together, show Buenaventura walking away from their next-door neighbor’s home before he turns up in their side yard.
He walks up to the driveway in the back of home, where the garage camera shows him approaching Denney’s mother from behind and speaking to her for a moment before he attacks her.
O’Donnell said Buenaventura went to two homes before he arrived at Denney’s mother’s home and was asking people questions like “Have you seen my dog?” and “Have you seen my little girl?”
As news of the attack has spread, however, O’Donnell said multiple people on social media have reported seeing someone matching the description of the suspect in the days before the attack. No one came forward to police, she said.
She’s using the situation as a teaching moment.
“If at any time you feel there is a threat to you our your community or your gut tells you something doesn’t feel right, just call us,” she said. “If you call 9-1-1 in good faith, you will not be penalized.”
Moving forward from the attack
As his mother has been recovering from her wound in the hospital, Denney and his father have been dealing with feelings of anger.
Denney was asking his mother questions about the attacker — recording her answers on his phone — that first time he saw her in the hospital. He wanted justice.
“I saw her and I was just furious,” he said. “In my head, (there was) that, ‘Hey, I want to find out who this guy is and I want to leave here and find him myself.’”
He’s also been worried about the safety of the neighborhood where his parents live and where he grew up, which he always considered safe. He’s worried now, for instance, that one of the street lights on their block has been out.
“You just have to constantly be on your guard,” he said.
He’s unsure when his mother might be able to be discharged, he said, but she’s been improving since her surgery. Doctors took her off a ventilator on Tuesday and she’s been to sit up and talk, he said.
The doctor has given her a good prognosis and she’s expected to fully recover. But getting over the trauma of the incident might take longer.
Denney and his family are planning to be there for her as she tries to return to a normal life.
“I think more than anything,” he said, “the long-term psychological effects is what’s going to be a problem.”
This story was originally published February 19, 2020 at 5:20 PM.
