TORONTO, Ohio

A Toronto man is accused of luring two girls near a Dumpster before beating them.

 Police said it happened on Tuesday at 3:30 p.m.  just feet away from their grandmother’s house.

 The girls, who are 12- and 13-year-old cousins, opened up to NEWS9’s Natalie Herbick about the shocking ordeal.

 “He was standing on the corner and we walked right past him.  He didn’t say anything and he was just on his cellphone,” said the 13-year-old.

 Moments later the girls said he lured them next to a Dumpster near their grandmother’s house along Outer Drive.

 “He said, 'Come here. There’s a deer over here.'  I asked him if it was dead or alive, and he said, 'I don’t know. Come look,'” added the teen.

 Toronto police said 30-year-old Danny Nichols had other intentions, first attacking the 12-year-old.

 “He hit me in the back of the head and I just fell to the ground and I didn’t know what happened,” she said.

 Police said he then went after the teen.

 “He hit me and I fell and then he kept hitting me and hitting me," the 13-year-old said. “I was screaming and screaming and he covered up my mouth so nobody would hear me.”

 Those screams may have saved the girls' lives. Police said before he could drag them over the nearby riverbank, neighbors walked outside and called 911. Police said Nichols took off running.

 LeeAnn Schiffman is the mother of the mother of the 13-year-old and said she feels the only reason nothing worse happened is because they girls were together.

 She said she has lived in the neighborhood her whole life and never thought something like this could happen.

 “My daughter doesn’t want to go out now.  She is scared.  She is up all night and, you know, this is her neighborhood,” said Schiffman.

 The girls managed to make it to their grandmother’s house, but then had to be taken to the hospital by ambulance to be treated for their injuries.

 Police arrested Nichols at an apartment in Carnegie Court shortly after the attack.  Police said detectives found bloody shoes in a wall that matched footprints of those at the scene and a jacket doused with bleach.

 Nichols is in the Jefferson County Jail without bond.

 Toronto police Capt. Rick Parker said Nichols has an extensive criminal past out of Pennsylvania and was out of jail on parole. 

 Nichols will go before a judge on Tuesday.

 Stay with NEWS9 and WTOV9.com for continuing coverage.