Woman bites off part of attacker’s tongue. And takes it to police.

Adele Barber decided that she wasn’t going to let her attacker get away without getting DNA evidence.

Trigger warning: This post deals with issues of sexual assault and domestic violence and may be triggering for survivors of abuse. 

Adele Barber, 29, was returning home from a doctor’s appointment when a man coming out of an alleyway bumped into her.

Refusing to let her attacker get away, the UK woman bit off part of his tongue – giving her crucial DNA evidence against him.

“It was only five o’clock in the afternoon… I mean you don’t assume anything is going to happen that early. It was getting dark, it was January but yes a guy coming out of an alley way just brushed past me,” she told ITV’s This Morning talk show.

“I didn’t think anything of it. He caught my eye and I thought he was just trying to be a bit flirtatious or something. But he carried on walking so I didn’t think anything more of it. Then as I carried on into the alley I heard footsteps running up behind me. I thought ‘OK’ maybe he wants to catch my number or something like that. And I turned around and he pushed me up against a wall and that’s when the attack started.”

It was a terrifying situation for Adele, and one she’d faced before: 10 years ago she was sexually assaulted, but her attacker was never charged due to lack of evidence. This was not a situation she was prepared to be in again.

READ MORE: “I hate him because he was supposed to be my best friend.” A powerful post about sexual assault…

“As soon as he pushed me up against the fence he tried to kiss me and forced his tongue into my mouth. I thought ‘right’, this left him vulnerable, I was just going to bite down as hard as I can, it will show it’s not consensual in any way, shape or form, get as much DNA as I can and try and cause enough pain to get this guy off me.

“I didn’t know I would get to bite a bit off the end of his tongue but I knew I would try and get some DNA in my teeth.”

Ms Barber managed to escape and ran roughly 1.6 km back to her home in Dunstable.

READ MORE: Total strangers raise over $500,000 for elderly disabled man attacked outside his home.

“I didn’t get it away straight away, it was a case of he pushed me up against the fence and for some bizarre reason when I bit him and tried to cause him pain, he enjoyed it. And then I knew something was not quite right. Most people would have backed off,” she explained.

“But because I was relentless, trying to grab chunks of his face for evidence then he sort of gave way. He was solid, there was no way I was going to fight him off me.

“When I got home I didn’t even speak to my husband I was straight on the phone to the police. I said ‘I’ve got this piece of evidence, what do I do with it?’ They said if I had a sterile pot to put it straight in that, which I did.”

Adele’s quick thinking enabled her attacker, Ferdinand Manila, to be caught a couple of months later when he committed more offences and his DNA matched the sample she obtained.

READ MORE: Rape victims quote their attackers. Words scarily similar to Blurred Lines

“After the first assault [10 years ago] I was absolutely a mess, I was young and naive and didn’t go to the police straight away and as a result there wasn’t enough evidence to convict them. Again it made me even more determined this time to get the evidence, to show it wasn’t consensual to the police as quick as I can. I was determined this time that no one was going to do this to me again, to make sure that this person gets the treatment that they need,” Adele said.

Now, she is urging other victims of sexual assault to fight back in an attempt to get their attacker’s DNA.

“The most important thing is to get as much evidence as you can. Obviously in that situation you can’t control what your body does, you can freeze. But you can fight back as much as you can and get to the police as quickly as you can.”

Right now we’re mentally high-fiving Adele for bringing her attacker to justice. But this type of vigilante-approach isn’t always the best approach when facing an assault.

READ MORE: Teenager’s cowardly attack on another school student. Just because he had red hair…

“When violence and assault are happening to you, do whatever you need to do to make yourself as safe as possible,” explains Karen Willis, executive officer at Rape and Domestic Violence Services Australia.

“If that happens to be fighting back or freezing up, then it’s the correct thing for you do to and the fact that you’re a survivor makes it the right thing to do.”

And there are many ways an attacker’s DNA can be captured.

“Forensic evidence could be found under your fingernails, seminal fluid on your clothing or skin, or saliva on your skin. Get to the police or hospital soon after so they can do a forensic test,” Karen explains.

If you have experienced, or are at risk of domestic violence or sexual assault, you can receive help by calling 1800 RESPECT – 1800 737 732.

If you are in immediate danger please call the police on 000.