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A 21-year-old University of Chicago student who was accosted by a thug with a gun turned the tables when the quick-thinking young lady wrestled the firearm away from the attacker and pulled out the magazine, a brave act captured on surveillance video.

The incident went down on Wednesday afternoon when the student, whose name is Maddi, was walking home from classes when she was approached by a man wearing a mask and brandishing a handgun in the 5600 block of South University Avenue where four suspects on opposite sides of the street were targeted to be robbed.

What happened next wasn’t likely what the masked criminal was expecting as she put up a fight, struggling with the assailant after he demanded that she hand over her phone and getting ahold of the weapon, all while a male student just sat on the ground watching the scene play out instead of rushing to her assistance.

The video has been posted to social media where it has gone viral, with many hailing her as a hero.

“I’ve always felt safe, personally. It’s upsetting as students we get these alerts all of the time. They’re very frequent, they vary in the severity of them. It’s just troubling that it becomes so desensitizing,” Maddi, who’s a senior at the school told local news outlet WGN Chicago.

“You never think it’s going to be you. I was walking on South University, which is a major artery of this school, it’s well-populated, it was broad daylight,” she said.

(Video: YouTube/WGN)

“He flashes the gun towards me and I kind of just go blank, I throw the phone behind my hands, we get into this tussle, and he eventually gets the phone from me,” she said. “I was grabbing maybe for my phone, maybe the gun, it’s really a blackout moment for me, and I realize that I was able to grab the magazine out of the gun.”

Maddi was able to get the magazine out of the gun and threw it into the bushes as the robber fled the scene, leaving behind a piece of evidence that could be of great assistance to police.

X users weighed in on her “impressive” ability to demonstrate grace under pressure in a dangerous situation.

“I couldn’t necessarily really register the threat ahead of me, so definitely wouldn’t advocate for fighting back. Losing a life over a phone is definitely not worth it,” she told WGN. “You never think it will be you and when I was confronted with that moment I was in utter disbelief.”

Chris Donaldson
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