Today, I can legitimately say that I felt like I was in danger.
At around 11:30 AM, I arrived at Westfield Mainplace in Santa Ana with the intention of reaping the 7/26.50 sale at Victoria Secret and PINK. An hour later, Iād be waiting for mall security and police.
At around 12:10, my cousin Lina and I were walking around the Sephora area located inside the JC Penney. She was preoccupied by the sales rack but I wasnāt that interested since I had no reason to buy makeup at that moment. Of course, to preoccupy myself I was glancing in every direction. At one point, a guy walked by and I made eye contact with him but saw nothing of it. After all, people accidentally made eye contact all the time, right?
At 12:17, Lina made her purchase and we made our way out of JC Penney via the mall entrance on the second floor. We started walking towards the middle of the mall towards Zumiez. Along the way, an older gentleman with a child tapped on Linaās shoulder and said to us, āExcuse me girls, but that man in front of you is following you and heās recording you too.ā We thanked him and made a sharp turn into Zumiez.
Now Iām going to be honest, Iāve had my fair share of stalking, cat-calling, and all that nonsense. But nothing is more scary than not noticing that itās happening to you. Nothing is more scary than not knowing and not knowing who this person is and how possibly calculating they are. I didnāt know him apart from the brief eye contact in JC Penney. I didnāt know his motives. He was a complete stranger.
In Zumiez, we pretended to be shopping. I was actually really interested in a hoodie but scared at the same time. Zumiezās window display had multiple hanging items which I would hide behind to check if he was there. For the first five minutes, he hung around in front of the store at a far enough distant to be able to appear as if he was just hanging out. We told an employee our fears and he immediately told us heād kick his ass for us and recommended we called security and to stay safe. We saw he was gone though so we took this as a sign that we could leave the store.
As we left the store, we made our way to the other end of the mall, towards Nordstrom. He had actually moved away from the entrance of Zumiez and was waiting for us to leave. Lina immediately wanted us to cut through a hallway towards Olive Garden but I was terrified of the thought of a guy possibly following us towards a fairly narrow hallway. We walked towards Nordstrom and made a stop in front of the Directory so Lina could get out her knife and hide it behind her back to try to scare him. He then took a giant risk and walked AROUND the directory display. For a good 5 seconds he was closer than five feet near me.
We quickly walked into Nordstrom and Lina flagged down two girls who were walking from the opposite direction. She told them our situation and I did a whole 360 of the store to check his position. I saw him duck behind some displays. The girls were concerned but they didnāt see him and told us they didnāt see him. We said our thank youās and as soon as we parted the girls said, āWe see him. And heās looking in this direction.ā
Lina started walking towards the exit to the parking lot where our car was but again, I refused. I was not going to get murdered in a parking lot. I had no clue the capacity of this guy. What if he followed us to our car? Prevented us from leaving? Linaās slow to lock her doors so what if he climbed into the backseat? FUCK THAT MESS. I made her quickly veer off to another section and she flagged down an employee to hide us in a dressing room. She called Nordstrom security and mall security.
12:30 was when Nordstrom security met with us. 1:30 was when the Santa Ana police met with us. I gave them his description cause being the criticizing fashionista that I am, I saw his attire pretty well. Around my boyfriendās height, 5ā11ish. Maybe taller.Ā Mid to late 30's.Ā Dark complexion, most likely Hispanic. Medium built. He had a mustache beard combo that looked like the result of not shaving for a few days. Dark, thick hair that was parted down the middle and possibly gelled. He wore a black shirt that was solid black mid chest up and grey striped mid chest down. Dark wash jeans. He had a distinct walk and shift eyes which gave me the heebie jeebies.
After filing the report information, we went to the room with the Nordstrom security cameras and helped the police find him on cameras. They got a picture of him, though not a very good one and printed out two copies. One was given to the police. Another to mall security. The most fucked up thing however was the fact that once we disappeared into the dressing room, this guy went back to the mall entrance of the store and sat down in the benches and fucking waited for us to come out. He probably only left when mall security entered the store or he got tired.
We were police escorted by one of the officers who talked to us (Officer Enriquez of the Santa Ana Police Department, you are amazing!) to our car and we went home after that. They reassured us they would look around the mall and keep the report on hand in case of other incidences.
Iām also so glad I only had to view security footage from the Nordstrom store. Just seeing him again on the footage made me shake so bad. If I had to view footage from the actual mall and caught him recording us like the guy who warned us said, I would definitely feel sick.
Iām an 18 year old and never have I felt so scared. The worst fear is not knowing what who is following you, why theyāre following you and how long theyāve been following you. Thank goodness for the man who was concerned enough to tell us. Thank goodness for the Nordstrom employees that helped us out and especially thank goodness for the officers who were so kind and understanding to our situation. Even if the situation was terrifying, the people who helped us definitely made it much more bearable. As a girl who is always paranoid and gets anxious really easily, I couldnāt ask for a better group of people to help out me and my cousin.
So creepy guy who followed us from one end of the mall to the other, I donāt know if you thought we were pretty, if our clothes were too revealing or what, I hope you get caught and I never have to see you again. There were so many girls at the mall, younger, older, dressed similarly or even more revealing and I fucking hope that if our appearance was a reason he followed us that he gets caught cause no girl should feel terrorized when all the wanted was a nice Sunday morning to take advantage of a nice sale.
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