8-INCH KNIFE NO MATCH FOR UNARMED VALOR.

Byline: DENNIS McCARTHY 

It was a little after 8 p.m. Oct. 19 when the three strangers heard the screams.

Luis Mendez, a produce clerk at Vons Market on Devonshire Boulevard in Northridge, had just finished his shift and was walking out the front door of the grocery store with an armful of empty boxes.

The 22-year-old Reseda man was going to start packing that night for his move to a new apartment. He never got the chance. More important things came up -- such as saving a pregnant woman's life.

Thomas Griffin was inside the store, standing in line with his wife, Kimberly, waiting to pay for their groceries.

When the screams came, the 35-year-old Chatsworth man looked at his wife, who shouted, ``Go.'' Thomas Griffin went, rushing out the front door of the market.

Tony Deri, 32, was driving by the Vons at the same time. The Chatsworth man pulled his car over, opened his trunk and got out his baseball bat to join Griffin and Mendez.

In a split second, three strangers made the same decision that will forever bond them in the mind and heart of Amanda Sillars, a 40-year-old pregnant woman who was being brutally attacked outside the market by a man with a knife.

``They saved my life and my baby's life that night,'' Sillars said. ``I'll never be able to repay them for their courage.''

But we can. With Sillars looking on Thursday, Mendez, Griffin and Deri were honored at the fifth annual Courageous Citizens Award Luncheon sponsored by the Kiwanis Club of Northridge and the Los Angeles County District Attorney's Office.

Sillars gave each man a beautiful bouquet of flowers and a hug. Then she told her story about her attacker.

``I saw him watching me, but I was only three parking spots from the front door of the market so I thought I could get into my car in time,'' she said. ``I should have run back into the store, but I didn't. That was a mistake I'll never make again, and I hope no woman does when she senses something is wrong. Run and get help.''

Sillars, whose baby is due in March, was in her car ready to swing her legs inside when the man blocked her from closing the door. He asked her for money.

``I screamed, and he told me to stop or he'd stab me. All that was going through my mind was to protect my baby at all costs. I started screaming again, kicking him and grabbing for the knife.

``He pulled his arm free and started slashing at me.''

Hearing the screams, Mendez threw his armload of empty boxes at the attacker and started shouting at him.

``I had no time to think, only react,'' he said. ``I threw the boxes and told him to get the heck away from her. Only I didn't use the word `heck.'''

The attacker, 62-year-old Ralph Walton, will be sentenced later this month after pleading no contest to attempted robbery with great bodily injury.

Mendez, Griffin and Deri chased Walton and finally cornered him a few blocks away. The men say he lunged at them with his 8-inch knife, warning them to stay away.

``We told him to get on the ground, but he just blew us off,'' Griffin said. ``I took Tony's bat and swung it at him, trying to knock the knife out of his hand.''

The three finally overpowered Walton and wrestled him to the ground.

``I'm rolling around on the ground with this guy when my cell phone goes off,'' Griffin said. ``I knew it was my wife, but I was too busy to answer it.''

Sillars was taken to the hospital with severe slashes to her forearm and cuts on her legs. Fortunately, no tendons or nerves were cut, and movement is back in her fingers, though not in her wrist.

``If there were more people like these men, it would be a better world,'' she said Thursday.

That goes for the two other recipients of the Courageous Citizen Awards who deserve our recognition, also.

Ana Flores followed three gang members after witnessing a shooting, and she watched as they disposed of the murder weapon. Despite fear of retribution, she led police to the gun and later testified at the trial of two gang members.

Makina Palmer, 15, of Pacoima saw a man pointing a gun at her brother's head after a quarrel. Despite being pressured by other youths in the neighborhood not to cooperate with the prosecution, Makina bravely testified in court.

Courage.

dennis.mccarthy(at)dailynews.com

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Photo:

Amanda Sillars gives flowers to Thomas Griffin, left, and Luis Mendez, two of three men who stopped a brutal knife attack on her and captured the slasher. The two men and the third, Tony Deri, were honored Thursday.

Tina Burch/Staff Photographer