Two karate instructors said they stopped a man who was trying to rape a woman in Brooklyn early on Tuesday, then chased down the fleeing attacker.
Luiz Ruiz and his stepson, Antonio Pina, said they were walking home from their martial arts studio after working late Monday night and heard a woman scream as they neared their home in East Williamsburg.
Ruiz said it was instinct when he rushed to help a 27-year-old woman who police later said had been grabbed and choked by an assailant who then tried to rape her.
Ruiz scared the man off and stayed by the woman's side, while Pina took off after the attacker.
Pina, meanwhile, chased the man for several blocks and helped police corner the suspect, later identified as 31-year-old Todd Deas.
Deas -- who had been released from prison in July and was living in a nearby homeless shelter -- was charged with attempted rape, felony assault and strangulation in the attack. State Corrections Department records show that he was serving four years of parole at the time of the attack.
The woman was treated and released after the attack and spent Tuesday recovering at her synagogue, according to her rabbi.
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The rabbi told NBC 4 New York that she would like to meet the men who saved her.
