Reward offered after woman 'scared to death' by attacker

LACOOCHEE, Fla. - Melody Howard has etched the face of her attacker into her memory.

“He was vicious,” Howard remembers. “He had the hardest, cruelest eyes.”

Howard was inside her Lacoochee apartment one night earlier this month. Someone knocked on the door. It was a “desperate knock,” according to Howard.

She answered the door. The man asked for a soda. Howard didn’t see the harm in that. She got him one. When she came back to the door, though, the man attacked.

“He jerked the screen (door) out of my hand,” Howard recalls. “He body-slammed the door and pushed me back.”

Using a gun, the man forced Howard to the ground, covering her face with a heating pad and a pillow case. He was yelling at her the whole time, demanding money and threatening her.

“(He was) telling her that he was going to blow her brains out,” said Det. Allen Proctor from the Major Crimes Unit of the Pasco County Sheriff’s Office.

The man stole money and a phone from Howard before leaving.

“I was scared to death,” Howard said. “I was so violated.”

Proctor said Howard probably shouldn’t have answered the door. More importantly, though, he wants to catch the man who did this.

“He’s not a good guy,” Proctor said. “He needs to be taken off the streets.”

Howard wants him off the streets too. Outside her apartment, she has hung two signs. One of them says “Robbed last night.” The other says “The troublemaker is back.”

“I want him taken down,” Howard said.

Crime Stoppers of Tampa Bay has offered a $1,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of this man. He is described as a black male, 20-25 years old, 5-foot-9, 160 pounds, with a short afro, dark complexion and prominent cheeks.

If you have information, call 1-800-873-TIPS.