A young woman demonstrated unimaginable courage after waking to a violent intruder in her apartment, an attack so severe she was forced to physically hold her own head to her body.
A Night of Terror in Her Own Home
In 1995, 25-year-old Jennifer Morey went to bed in her apartment, expecting a quiet night. She was violently awakened by the weight of a man on top of her, attempting to remove her underwear. "I reach my hands up, and I feel this knife that’s being held against my throat," Morey later recalled. "And it was the clearest thought that went through my brain and woke me up: 'Oh, I’m being raped.'"
Fighting back with all her strength, Morey screamed and kicked. In retaliation, her attacker stabbed her in the right side of her face. She described a sudden "explosion of blood, like a hot waterfall." The situation escalated horrifically when the assailant slit her throat. Believing she was going to die, her survival instinct kicked in.
The Fight for Survival and a Lifesaving Call
Somehow, Morey managed to escape to her bathroom. As blood poured from her neck wound, she used toilet paper to try and stem the bleeding while using her body weight to keep the door shut. Realising she could not simply wait, she forced the wedged door open to find a phone.
The attacker, Bryan Wayne Gibson, had cut the power to her apartment, disabling the lights and landline. Fortunately, Morey owned a mobile phone—a rarity in 1995—which proved critical. She dialled 911 and was connected to dispatcher Richard Everett.
While on the call, she heard a knock at her apartment door. Thinking it was help, she moved to answer, but Everett urgently instructed her not to open it under any circumstances. This advice saved her life; the person knocking was Gibson, attempting to regain entry.
Justice, Accountability, and a New Life
Police later that night arrested Gibson, a 26-year-old security guard who was supposed to be patrolling her apartment complex. An investigation revealed Gibson had a troubled history. His employer, Pinkerton Security, had repeatedly reassigned him over three years due to complaints rather than dismissing him. He was ultimately placed at Morey's complex.
Shockingly, reports indicated that between 1991 and 1995, 130 Pinkerton guards were convicted of felonies in Texas alone. In 1998, Morey filed a successful lawsuit against Pinkerton Security, receiving a substantial, though undisclosed, financial award. That same year, she used her resilience to open her own law practice, becoming a highly accomplished family law attorney in the Fort Worth area.
Morey remains eternally grateful to Richard Everett, the 911 dispatcher. "Having instinct, intuition and a big heart, [Richard] saved my life," she said. He later attended her wedding. Bryan Wayne Gibson was released from prison in 2015 and is now a registered sex offender, believed to be living in Texas.
