Leonidas has done well at his job in New Bedford. He works at one of the many scallop processing plants in the city, progressing over the past three years from floor worker to manager. He now oversees inventory and operates a forklift, in addition to working with the scallops themselves.
It was just before Christmas, in 2011, when Leonidas was attacked. He had worked all morning and walked home for lunch. When he entered his first-floor apartment he could see that the bathroom window had been broken, and that the place was in disarray. He heard footsteps upstairs, and realized that a thief was in the building.
He remembered there was a machete in his roommate’s closet – it had been left there by previous tenants – as he heard the thief running down the stairs. He picked up the machete and ran outside, catching up with the man. He grabbed him and shouted at him to drop the bags of stolen things. When the man refused, Leonidas hit him in the arm with the blunt end of the machete, trying to loosen his grip on the bags. What he didn’t know was that the man was carrying a long knife, serrated on both sides. The man pushed Leonidas to the ground and began stabbing him: in the chest, the shoulder, the abdomen, the back – seven times in all. The worst stab wound was inside his mouth, under his tongue.
Leonidas stumbled back to work, and his boss immediately called the police. An ambulance took him to the hospital, where the police came to conduct their investigation. They asked Leonidas a series of questions, and showed him a set of photographs. He was able to identify the thief because he’d seen his face clearly, mostly from a conversation they’d had. In Spanish the thief had yelled: Let me go, I have a family! Leonidas had replied: If you want to support your family, why don’t you get a job?
After a long recovery – he could not eat for two weeks – Leonidas eventually went back to work. He moved with his father into a second-floor apartment in the same neighborhood. The police arrested the man who’d attacked him, and Leonidas appeared in court several times, cooperating with the prosecution and providing his testimony. The man was put in jail for attempted murder, but Leonidas doesn’t know if he’s since been released. He says he’s afraid to run into him again.