For the first time, the sisters of a Massachusetts woman who was brutally stabbed in Cohasset after meeting with a man she had previously met on Tinder are speaking out about the incident.
The victim, Maegan Tapley, is still recovering from serious wounds and broken bones, while the man who stabbed her, Eric Stelzer, died in police custody after police used a Taser on him to stop the attack, authorities said.
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The victim's sisters, Bridget and Hilary Tapley, said the two met on Tinder, but the situation wasn't a first date. Their sister had seen the man a few times before the night she was stabbed, and they're now thanking police for saving her.
"We were this close from losing her," Bridget Tapley said. "It’s like hearing her tell a tale of a horror movie she played a character in."
The Tapley sisters say Maegan's wounds are too graphic to show, saying she has broken bones in her face and hands, with hair pulled out and countless stab wounds.
"Her bottom teeth are all broken," Hilary Tapley said. "There’s not an inch of her body that he did not cut, not just slash, like deep wounds."
Now, the family has learned more about what happened that night.
Bridget Tapley said Stelzer came to their home in Saugus to see Maegan, and he asked for a ride home.
The two had been seeing each other for a couple weeks after meeting on the dating app Tinder.
"She didn’t want to tell him to take an Uber or have him be outside in the cold, so she wanted to just drive him home," Bridget Tapley said.
But when Maegan got to Stelzer's house, she said he didn't let her leave and started stabbing her.
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Someone heard her screams and called 911, and police broke down the door and found her.
"The way she explained it is, she felt like she was rolling around in a pool of blood and glass," Bridget Tapley said. "I guess when she put her arm up, it was covered in blood, they just saw her bloody arm."
Police reportedly used a Taser on Stelzer to stop him from attacking Maegan, and he died on the way to the hospital.
"I'm very thankful for the Cohasset police, because if they didn’t get there probably exactly when they did, then my little sister would be dead," Hilary Tapley said. "She said she was about 30 seconds away from giving up."
But the Tapleys said their little sister is stronger than anyone, and she'll keep fighting until she fully recovers from the brutal attack.
"He didn’t break her spirit," Hilary Tapley said. "She's already thinking of things she’s gonna do to better herself when she does recover."
The family told WFXT that Maegan has already undergone multiple surgeries, and she'll need more over the next few months.
They set up a GoFundMe page to help pay for some of her medical bills, which can be found by clicking here.
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