Police are checking one possible lead into the World of Wonder school stabbing after a man said he saw the suspect just after the little girl was attacked.
The 7-year-old second-grader was on the playground May 6 during school hours when a man pushed her off a swing and stabbed her outside the pre-kindergarten to eighth-grade school at 4411 Oakridge Drive in Dayton. The young girl is recovering at home.
Dayton police said they hit “a stone wall” in the investigation into the unprovoked attack, and there is a $7,000 reward for information leading to an arrest offered by management of the Dayton Airport Hampton Inn in Englewood and Meadowbrook Crossing Shopping Center in Dayton.
One man spoke to News Center 7 reporter Mike Campbell, and said he has information about the stabbing suspect and has been cooperating with detectives. The man, who asked not to be named out of concern for his safety, said he was visiting at a house two blocks from the school on the day of the attack when someone came through the front door.
“He had a little bit of blood, I mean not a lot but a little, mostly on the side of his body,” the man said. “He ran in, didn’t knock, just opened and ran in.”
The man said the strange circumstances led him to leave right away. Later, the man said he learned about the stabbing at the school and said after talking to others he now believes that person is the man who attacked the young girl at school.
The possible stabbing suspect knows someone else who visits the house, and ” he comes to the house frequently, had frequented that house many times beforehand,” the man said. The possible suspect stayed at the house until early the next morning. The man thinks the suspect has moved around several times since the stabbing.
The man said he called police a few days after the stabbing incident, but Dayton police said he didn’t agree to meet face-to-face until a week ago. It’s because the tipster has a warrant for his arrest on a misdemeanor charge. Now, he said the case is too important for him to stay silent.
“It’s the fact to help right a wrong, it could have gone much worse, turned into something you see on TV in other states,” he said.
Police said they’re still following up on tips that man gave them. It hasn’t yet led to a suspect, a person of interest or an arrest. Detectives are continuing their plea for anyone with information to call 937-333-COPS(2677) or Crime Stoppers at 937-222-STOP(7867)