Mary Vincent (artist)

Mary Vincent (born 1963) is an artist and victims' advocate. She became known to the public after surviving a violent attack in which her arms were cut off while hitchhiking in 1978. Vincent has focused her adult life on her art, and she generally avoids the public spotlight. Vincent is one of seven children and lived with her parents in Las Vegas. Her father worked as a mechanic and married her mother, a blackjack dealer, while serving in the military. Vincent's parents were going through a messy divorce which caused her to run away from their home in Las Vegas. After a brief period living on the streets and inside unlocked cars, Vincent hitchhiked to her grandfather's home in Berkeley, California in September 1978. After arriving in California and staying with her grandfather for a while, Vincent became homesick and decided to hitchhike back to Las Vegas. While hitchhiking, Vincent grew tired and started flagging drivers down for a ride, eventually coming upon Lawrence Singleton, who let her into his vehicle. During the ride, Vincent grew suspicious of Singleton when he began purposely driving the wrong way and eventually attempted to escape, but Singleton knocked her unconscious with a sledgehammer before she could get away. When she regained consciousness, Singleton tied her up and violently raped her, then proceeded to chop both of her forearms off with a hatchet. He then threw her down a cliff and drove off, leaving her for dead. Vincent managed to survive the fall and climb back up the cliff despite having lost her hands, and proceeded to dip the stumps of her forearms in mud and hold them up to slow the bleeding. She then went on to flag down drivers for help, and after trudging along Interstate 5 for nearly three miles, she was able to get the attention of a couple who helped her get medical attention. In the hospital, Vincent immediately worked with police to help identify and find her attacker, insisting on postponing sleep to finish creating a composite sketch for investigators.