Woman, 88, scares off would-be rapist with HIV claim

Credit: Getty Images/Larry W. Smith

Credit: Getty Images/Larry W. Smith

A quick-thinking 88-year-old Pennsylvania woman scared off a potential rapist when she told her assailant she had HIV, WPVI reported.

A man posing as an apartment complex worker forced himself inside Helen Reynolds' home and used duct tape to bind her, police said.

"He wrapped it all around my face and my nose and my eye glasses," Reynolds told WPVI. "He had a piece in my mouth."

But Reynolds was able to speak, and talked the suspect out of raping her.

"I said to him, 'Well it's like this,'" Reynolds told WPVI. "'You might as well know the truth.' I said, 'I have HIV, and my husband died from it,' which is a lie. When I said that, he just walked out of the bedroom. That's the comment that saved my life."

No one has been arrested in connection with the attack, police said.

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