{"id":307028,"date":"2026-10-15T06:38:20","date_gmt":"2026-10-15T06:38:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/307028\/"},"modified":"2026-10-15T06:38:20","modified_gmt":"2026-10-15T06:38:20","slug":"police-issue-alert-after-woman-fights-off-attacker-on-west-chester-pennsylvania-walking-trail","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/307028\/","title":{"rendered":"Police issue alert after woman fights off attacker on West Chester, Pennsylvania, walking trail"},"content":{"rendered":"

The West Chester Police Department is looking for a man who they say assaulted a woman on a walking trail in the 500 block of Dean Street Tuesday evening.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The woman was walking just before 7 p.m. when an unknown man approached and assaulted her, according to a news release from police. She was able to push the man away and run. Police released images from surveillance video captured nearby.<\/p>\n

The suspect was around 6 feet tall and was wearing a gray or silver hooded jacket, according to police. He was last seen running toward nearby Everhart Park.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

West Chester Police Department<\/p>\n

The trail is less than a mile from West Chester University.<\/p>\n

In a statement, police say the department “recognizes the concern this incident may cause within our community. We are committed to investigating this incident and appreciate any help from the community.”<\/p>\n

Police are gathering evidence and increasing patrols in and around surrounding parks and neighborhoods.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I commend the victim for their courage in reporting this incident, and I encourage everyone to exercise safe practices out in the community, which include: walking with others when possible, staying in well-lit areas when possible, carrying a cell phone, and being observant of their surroundings,” Chief Joshua Lee said in a statement.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Jamie Paxson lives near where the attack occurred and came out to help search his wooded property moments after he heard about what happened.\u00a0<\/p>\n

“I was just on my land here searching, seeing if anyone was hiding,” Paxson said. “There are places to hide back there, but I didn’t want to disturb the police, so I came up this way and police were right here.”<\/p>\n

Paxson says he also let police know about the security cameras on a nearby home, including one his neighbor added just this past weekend, which recorded the incident.<\/p>\n

“He had surveillance signs because I told police he’s got a surveillance camera, but the one that caught that was one that was strapped to a blue bird box that he just put up Saturday, so what’s the odds of that happening.”<\/p>\n

Anyone with information is asked to contact West Chester police at 610-696-2700 and reference incident number WC-26-29110.<\/p>\n

\n More from CBS News\n <\/p>\n

In:<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The West Chester Police Department is looking for a man who they say assaulted a woman on a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":307029,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[1557,28,30,29,53118],"class_list":["post-307028","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-pennsylvania","tag-chester-county","tag-pennsylvania","tag-pennsylvania-headlines","tag-pennsylvania-news","tag-west-chester-pa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307028","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=307028"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/307028\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/307029"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=307028"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=307028"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=307028"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}