Security guard who prevented sexual assault honored by Metro
LAS VEGAS NV February 21 2019 – A security guard who helped stop a potential sexual assault in a Las Vegas nightclub was honored by local police on Tuesday.
On Feb. 9 at XS Nightclub, Mann Sioson said he saw a man trying to leave the club with a woman and something seemed “off.”
“It didn’t look like they had come together, and she couldn’t take care of herself,” Metro police Capt. John Pelletier said. “So he went and intervened and he asked questions, questions he learned in the program.”
The program Capt. Pelletier is talking about is the Stay Safe Class. It teaches Strip nightclub employees how to identify predators and look for victims. When Manny saw the man leaving with the woman, he acted quick.
“It didn’t look right,” Pelletier said. “He went and asked the guy questions and the guy took off running. Manny being heroic, now we don’t have a victim, imagine what the other story could have been.”
The Stay Safe Class is new. Metro and the Rape Crisis Center put it together about a year ago.
Now they’re working to get it into every club on the Strip. So far, they’ve trained 4,000 night club employees, and even though it’s new they’re already seeing progress.
“We have 25 documented cases where we know we have prevented something,” Capt. Pelletier said. “So 25, 25 is huge. How awesome is that?”
Today the Rape Crisis Center celebrated moving into a bigger building, they also took time to celebrate Manny. He was even presented with a certificate from Metro and a community heroes award from the Rape Crisis Center for preventing a rape.
And Metro said Manny’s story is just the latest indication their prevention efforts are working.
“Year to date we’ve got a 29% reduction in sexual assault and last year we saw a 9% reduction in violent crime,” Capt. Pelletier said of the strip area.
Metro said their goal is to eradicate all violence against women, and have a message for the people preying on our community.
“Not on our watch. Not on our watch,” Capt. Pelletier said.
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