Stabbed 6 times in Sacramento, teen faces long recovery. ‘Part of me...died that night’

Freshly graduated from Rocklin High School in June, MarcoAntonio Bindel methodically planned his future.

Grow his three businesses. Save up money. Enroll in college after a gap year.

Instead, weeks after he turned 18 years old, the young entrepreneur barely clung to life after a brutal stabbing in Sacramento left him punctured six times on Sept. 14. Profusely bleeding, he arrived at one hospital in a vehicle with two flat tires before being rushed to a different hospital for emergency surgery, he said in an interview.

“There were moments where I just wanted to die.”

Months after the incident, Bindel grapples with pain. He startles easily, experiences anxiety when leaving his home and will need physical rehabilitation to rebuild his strength, Bindel’s mother Athena Hendrix said. He cannot feel his left shoulder or the skin around his torso where he was stabbed.

“No one should have to go through” this, Hendrix said.

The incident

Bindel and a few friends went to World Famous Hotboys chicken on 21st Street and Kayak Alley. It offered a chance to get out of the house and meet other peers their age, Hendrix said.

The attack broke out as the group returned home. A disagreement erupted, and Bindel was stabbed in the process of trying to defend a friend, she said.

“The fact that this happened was so shocking,” Hendrix said.

Officers were called just after 3 a.m. to the 3000 block of Alhambra Boulevard in North Oak Park for a report of a group of people fighting, said Officer Allison Smith, a spokeswoman for the Sacramento Police Department.

The group of people was still fighting when officers arrived at the scene. Officers learned a victim had been stabbed and was taken to a hospital, Smith said.

A teenage girl has been arrested in connection to the incident, Smith said.

After learning of her son’s condition and his transfer to an emergency trauma center, Hendrix rushed to find him. She wondered for hours if her son would live through the surgery. Even police and doctors didn’t think he could live after severe blood loss, Hendrix said.

He needed 6 liters of blood, 6 liters of plasma and 38 staples. A knife nicked his lung and caused internal bleeding, Hendrix said.

But Bindel expressed optimism in the wake of his injuries. His relationship with God deepened as he leaned on prayer in the wake of almost dying, he said, and he’s learned lessons about himself, such as trusting his intuition.

But his plans to save up money through his three businesses have been waylaid. He had founded a roofing company, jewelry store and a social media business selling antiques, to honor a friend.

Medical bills piled up and siphoned away money he sought to save for college. Bindel also cannot work full time while grappling with his injuries. The family created a GoFundMe to help with the costs.

Memories of that night still loom large.

“There is a part of me that died that night and that I will never get back,” Bindel said.