ONLY ON 3: ‘This is going to happen, I’m gonna jump’; Survivor escapes from sexual predator

WILMINGTON, NC (WWAY)- Police said a repeat sexual offender went looking for an unlocked unit at Ashton Townhomes on Wednesday morning.

They said Clarence Jacobs Jr. found an unlocked home, and a victim. She asked not to be identified. So, for our purposes, we’ll call her Jane Doe. She’s telling her story in hopes of saving someone else.

Jane Doe said she was getting ready for work at her townhouse on Racine Drive and had to leave briefly to move her car. She forgot to lock the door. When she got back inside, she continued getting ready for work.

“I hear my storm door,” she said.

Her dog started barking and wouldn’t come downstairs. So, she called her boyfriend and went to grab her dog. She said that’s when she saw her attacker.

“He jumped out of the closet and I saw the guy’s face and his eyes looking at me, and I just screamed. I yelled, ‘Call 911,’ and he took the phone from me,” she said.

The struggle began and he pushed her into the spare bedroom.

“At one point, he had me between the nightstand and he had me down,” she recalled. “He pulled my pants down and I realized I had my keys in my hand.”

She put her keys through her fingers.

“Because I didn’t want to piss him off,” she said. “I wanted to actually hurt him.”

She said he took the keys, tossed them and told her if she continued to fight, he’d kill her.

She talked him into going downstairs to get money from her purse.

“Trying to buy time, because I know in my heart, my boyfriend has called the cops and they will be here,” she explained. “But, it seemed like forever.”

She said she was doing and saying anything to get a chance to escape.

“I hear him coming back upstairs and I realize, finally, that there is a window right there, and I grab my dog,” she said.

She ran out of the window and stood on the ledge.

“I looked down and I looked back in the room, and I looked down,” she explained. “I was just like, ‘This is going to happen, I’m gonna jump,’ and I just jumped. I didn’t look back at all. I didn’t feel anything. I just ran as fast as I could.”

She ran to a neighbor’s house where she was able to call 911.

Police said they were already on the way and arrested Jacobs as he tried to flee.

But, she doesn’t think of herself as a victim. She’s a survivor.

“Because I value myself,” she said. “You can take on something that’s bigger than you and stronger than you if you really want to.”

Police said Jacobs is a registered sex offender who’s criminal past includes indecent liberties with a minor and felony breaking and entering.

He is in the New Hanover County Jail under $500,000 bond.