By james art The stranger lunged at the young woman from behind and smothered her in his arms.
He had followed her for about half a mile on a sultry August evening, and by walking at a steady pace he had managed to keep up with her slow jog. Realizing he was behind her, she walked under a bridge on Salem Avenue, hoping he would pass. He used this moment instead of attacking.
She screamed for help and struggled to free herself as he pulled her off the pavement onto a patch of dirt. Seconds passed, maybe 20. He didn’t let go. The Long Branch Trail and Research Park were visible. Traffic was speeding up on the overhead bridge. But this stretch of road, not far from the center, was deserted.
Through the terror and panic, the clearest thoughts formed in her mind.
He would kidnap her, rape and kill her, or sell her to sex traffickers.
“I wasn’t going home,” she remembers thinking. “I would never see my family again.”
“That’s not fair”
Ingrid Schneider puts a name and a face to a crime that has scared many women in Winston-Salem, especially those women who run alone, as she did that August night in 2023.
Most media outlets, including the Winston-Salem Journal, do not publish the names of sexual assault victims because of the particularly sensitive nature of the crime and the stigma associated with it. Publishing names may also discourage other women from reporting such crimes, which are already under-reported.
With her attacker recently convicted and serving a sentence, Schneider, 27, feels ready to speak freely about what happened, not as a warning to other women, but to remind them that they have every right to navigate the world with the same confidence , fearlessness and sense of safety like men.
There is another reason.
Schnader wants to be the voice of women who went out running and never came back.
Women like Alyssa Lockits, 34, who was shot and killed on a greenway in Nashville, Tennessee, earlier this month.
And Laken Riley, 22, a nursing student who was beaten and strangled to death during a morning run in Athens, Georgia, in February.
And Judith Nealon, 44, who was kidnapped and beaten to death in Woodstock, Connecticut, in 2005.
Wikipedia maintains a long list of people killed while running.
Often the response to such deaths is for women to be more careful.
“That’s not fair. Yes, always be aware of your surroundings. But when are we going to be sure that men understand consent?” Schneider said. “We want to be able to walk outside. We don’t want to be called cats. We want to feel comfortable in our bodies. I want to be a voice for these women who cannot speak. It’s just not fair, and I don’t know when it’s going to change.”
New to running
Schnader started running in January 2023, shortly after she and her husband moved to Winston-Salem. A fitness enthusiast, Schneider said she likes how it’s more convenient than mountain biking, which often requires towing a bike and driving to a trailhead.
Working remotely from his apartment at Plant 64 in the Innovation Quarter, Schneider found it easy to escape by simply going outside and hitting the Long Branch Trail, popular with dog walkers, runners and cyclists.
She often took a route popular with local running clubs — taking the Long Branch Trail along Research Parkway, turning right on Rams Drive and another right on Salem Avenue, leading back downtown.
“I’ve always felt safe,” she said.
Schneider saw running alone as an act of independence, perhaps even a challenge. She said she was in a relationship with a man who controlled her every move, who wouldn’t let her run on her own if she was a runner at the time.
“So it was very important to me after this relationship that I never have a man telling me what to do,” she said.
After pushing himself too hard in preparation for the CraftHalf Half Marathon in April 2023, Schneider changed his training methods, focusing more on intervals, which sometimes meant running at a slow pace to keep his heart rate down.
On the evening of the attack, Schneider went for a run around 5 p.m., with the temperature hovering around 85 degrees. A few hundred yards past the starting point, she saw a young man, Dylan Cody Smyers, walking toward her on Research Parkway. She tried to do what she says all Alabamians do — make eye contact and say “Hey.”
“It’s Southern hospitality,” Schnader said.
Smyers, Schnader recalled, averted his eyes.
Turning right onto Rams Drive, Schneider noticed that Smyers had turned around and was now following her. She reasoned that perhaps he had gone for a walk and simply returned to where he had started.
At the top of the hill on Rams Drive, he was close enough to hear his footsteps. Now she was concerned. As soon as her fear intensified, she told herself she was crazy to be excited. It’s an internal dialogue that all women have had at some point in their lives, whether it’s walking to their car at night or driving down a quiet road.
Is this man following me or am I being paranoid?
With the sound of his footsteps increasing, she made a bold move. She turned to face him.
“Oh, you scared me,” she said.
“I didn’t mean to scare you,” he said. His voice was sweet.
Then she decided to slow down to let Smyers pass her under the bridge.
“And he grabs me from behind, and all of a sudden he grabs my hands and pulls me off the sidewalk, and he’s like, ‘You have to come with me. I won’t hurt you,” she said. “And I scream for help and then I’m like, ‘Yeah, there’s nobody around.’
She struggled and screamed so loudly that her throat hurt for days.
Although he couldn’t completely free himself, she was wearing sunscreen and was sweaty from running, which prevented him from getting a better grip, she said.
Eventually, a car appeared that spooked Smyers. He let go of Schneider and ran away. She immediately called 911 and told them that while she was okay, she needed to talk. Someone had tried to take her.
As she described what happened, she heard sirens approaching.
It took Winston-Salem police two days to locate and arrest Smyers. Surveillance video showed him arriving at the scene in a truck and approaching the area where he encountered Schnader. He later admitted to police detectives that he had captured Schnader so he could rape her.
Winston-Salem police also linked Smyers to a July 10, 2023, incident in which Smyers attempted to kidnap a female employee from the UNC School of the Arts.
The August incident was the first of three attacks on women that happened within days of each other in and around the city centre. Six days after Schneider’s attack, a man held a knife to a woman’s throat in the heart of the Innovation District at 1 p.m. as she tried to get into her car. Twelve days later, a 77-year-old woman was raped in her shop near Hanes Park on Sunday morning.
The police identified and arrested the culprits in these cases as well.
But for some women, the damage was done. Some women later told Schneider that after hearing about the attack on her, they chose to run other routes or not run alone.
63% of assaults go unreported
Schneider initially processed the trauma in ways she said she hated. She looked at herself critically and wondered why he stopped pursuing her. Was it because she was wearing a tighter tank top? What if he was a faster runner?
For a while, she dressed in looser running clothes and carried heat spray. But every man she passed became a potential attacker in her eyes.
“And that’s not the way I want to live my life,” she said.
Three days after she was attacked, Shander went on another solo run, down the Long Branch Trail and along the Salem Creek Greenway. She jumped when a passing child called out something. But she knew it was important to get back on track and overcome her fear.
She viewed each run as a “repeat” or repetition of an action.
Runners practice reps to get stronger; she would use every run to make her braver.
“I have to make an effort every time I run. I think about him on 90 percent of my runs because I’m doing what I was doing when I got tackled,” Schnader said. “So it’s not like I’m perfect and recovered, but I’m doing reps.”
One message Schneider wants the women to know is the importance of calling 911. By calling them immediately, police were able to find important evidence such as Smyers’ boot prints and his DNA on her smartwatch.
“There are a thousand reasons why women don’t report it, one of them is the feeling of hopelessness that they won’t find the man,” Schnader said.
According to the National Sexual Assault Resource Center, 63% of sexual assaults are not reported to the police.
Earlier this month, Smyers pleaded guilty to first-degree kidnapping, sexual assault and possession of a controlled substance on prison premises and was sentenced to serve up to seven years in prison. He must also register as a sex offender for 30 years.
Schneider, who was there for the sentencing, was mostly pleased with the outcome.
“I want the world to understand that you can’t treat women like dirt and get away with it,” she said.
Now living in Huntersville, Schnader remains committed to running. In a few weeks, she plans to run the Novant Health Charlotte Marathon.
Last week, after recounting the horror of that day, she returned to the patch of dirt under the bridge as runners from a local club shot past her.
A moment later, soft colors swirled in the evening sky, chimney swifts circled the Innovation Quarter smokestack, and Schneider laced up his shoes and went for a run.