Utah high school stabbing victim speaks out
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Chris Jones, KUTV
OREM, Utah (KUTV) — When Yafeth Ortiz sat down in front of his gym locker early Nov. 15, he was expecting another normal day at Mountain View High School; he got everything but.
“About five to 10 seconds after I hear (the bell) somebody yells, ‘There’s someone killing in here!'” Ortiz said. The teenager said he looked up and saw the chaos unfolding.
“I turned to my right and I see someone on the ground just holding his neck — I see like a bunch of blood.”
Ortiz said he saw the boy who is now accused of stabbing five other students standing next to the teenager on the ground.
“I took a step or two and he (suspect) comes face to face with me, he looks straight into my eyes and he says, ‘Hey Yafeth,’ he calls me by name and he just stabs me.”
Ortiz said another student ushered him into a small room inside the locker room. The student kept an eye on the suspect in another part of the locker, then, he told Ortiz to run as soon as the suspect began moving towards the injured teen.
Ortiz said he ran from the violent rampage and noticed just how injured he was.
“I see him stab someone else. That’s where I stood up I looked down to the ground, I see blood dripping; I see my shirt full of blood; and I see my hands, they’re all full of blood,” said Ortiz, who wondered if he would survive the stabbing. “That’s where I went into shock right away. I was thinking like, I’m done here.”
Ortiz ran to safety and called his mother. He was taken to the hospital with a stab wound to his neck. He had his stitches taken from his neck Wednesday and said, although the student who stabbed him caused a lot of pain for nearly half a dozen students, he is not angry at the boy.
“I also feel like it’s kind of sad because he’s like a nice kid, he was and he still is a nice kid, but it’s like sad to think about the decision he made.”