This home intruder messed with the wrong grandmother.
Willie Murphy, 82, may only be 5 feet tall and 105 pounds, but she has gained national renown for her age-defying strength and prowess as a powerlifter. Apparently, an intruder who tried to attack her last week was unaware of that fact.
Murphy told Fox affiliate WHAM that an unidentified man started pounding on her door and ultimately broke into her home in Rochester, N.Y., on Nov. 21. She not only fought him off, but sent him to the hospital.
Rochester police told TODAY that officers responded to her 911 call at 10:53 p.m. after the man knocked on her door claiming to be shot.
Murphy told police that the man asked her to call an ambulance and then wanted her to open the front door and let him inside. When she refused, she said he broke the door and attacked her.
"Young man is in my home, broke the door, and you know what, it's kind of semi-dark and I'm alone and I'm old, but guess what? I'm tough,'' she said.
Murphy, who says she can deadlift 225 pounds, told WHAM she picked up a nearby table and fought back. Police said she actually struck him in the head with a stool.
The intruder soon realized a troubling fact.
“He picked the wrong house to break into,” Murphy said. "I picked up the table and went to work on him."
Rochester Police Investigator Jacqueline Shuman told TODAY in an email, "It appeared that the suspect was extremely intoxicated and not aware of what was going on."
After she got the man on the ground, Murphy said she began jumping on him and then grabbed a bottle of shampoo and squirted it in his eyes.
“I got the broom,” she told the station. “He’s pulling the broom. I’m hitting him with the broom.”
Police then arrived in response to her earlier emergency call.
"He wants to get the heck out of there, and I'm trying to help him get out of the house, but he's too heavy,'' she said. "I can't move him. He's dead weight.
"He's laying down already because I had really did a number on that man. I'm serious."
The man was taken away by ambulance and treated for his injuries at a local hospital. His name was not released because he was not arrested and Murphy did not file any charges, according to Shuman.
"I think he was happy when he went in the ambulance because I sent him in the ambulance,'' Murphy said. "Yes, I did."