Oakland City Councilman Dan Kalb said on Tuesday that he and his former chief of staff were among the good Samaritans who helped rescue a woman who was stabbed near City Hall last week.
Kalb said he was meeting with Olga Bolotina at the Peet's Coffee shop at 1615 Broadway at about 5 p.m. on Jan. 2 when they heard a commotion outside and saw a 54-year-old woman being stabbed by a 70-year-old man later identified by police as Clinton Lucas of Oakland.
Kalb, who was elected as the council's president pro tem at its first meeting of the year on Monday, said he and Bolotina yelled at Lucas and they were joined by two men who also helped the woman.
Oakland police Officer Edvin Mendez wrote in a probable cause statement that one of the men, who hasn't been identified, tackled Lucas to the ground and subdued him until police arrived and arrested him.
Mendez said Lucas and the woman had been arguing on an Alameda-Contra Costa Transit District bus and after they got off the bus in the 1600 block of Broadway he continued to yell at her.
Mendez wrote that Lucas apparently was armed with a 4-inch-long black foldable knife, approached the woman and made "numerous thrusting actions at her chest area, striking her several times."
The woman suffered three stab wounds, had two collapsed lungs and had to have a tube placed in her windpipe to help her breathe, according to Mendez.
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The woman is in critical but stable condition.
Mendez wrote that based on witness statements and video surveillance of the stabbing "it appears Lucas intended to kill the victim."
Lucas has been charged with willful, deliberate and premeditated attempted murder and assault with a deadly weapon.
He's being held at the Santa Rita Jail in Dublin without bail and is scheduled to return to court on Jan. 16 to be assigned an attorney and possibly enter a plea.
Kalb said the man who tackled Lucas left the area after police arrived but said he hopes the man comes forward so he can thank him.
