A Bay Area college student got the fright of her life after a homeless man scaled the entryway of her off-campus apartment and chased her inside.
Surveillance video captured the suspect climbing the entrance to UC Berkeley junior Eden Winograd’s complex and following her after returned from walking her dog Tuesday night.
She first noticed the man eyeing her outside the building.
“I started to panic a little bit, but I didn’t want to offend him if he was just standing there,” she told NBC Bay Area, adding that she crossed the street to move away from the suspect.
“I started speeding up and heard his feet banging on the floor behind me,” she said.
“I went up to the gate, I buzzed myself in, I went, and I closed it, and then I heard clanging sounds while I was walking inside, and I turned around, and he was like scaling the gate.”
Surveillance video showed the suspect placing his feet on the door’s push bar before hopping over the entrance carrying what officials said was likely a barbecue lighter.
Winograd managed to make it to her building’s elevator safely and called police.
“My heart sank, I was out of breath, my heart was pounding,” she told NBC Bay Area.
She posted the surveillance footage on her TikTok account, with the clip viewed more than a million times.
Berkeley Police found the man the next laying on the sidewalk the next day and arrested him. The case has been submitted to prosecutors for review.
Winograd says the traumatizing incident is still affecting her..
“I don’t care if they have a weapon in their hand or nothing in their hand, I don’t want to be chased the second I step out of my apartment,” she said.
“I don’t want to be chased and have to watch someone claw their way up a wall to get to where I live.”
