Pregnant pepper spray victim: 'It was like being on fire'

She's only been in Seattle a short time. And on Labor Day she made her first trip to the Space Needle.

She and her girlfriend had just turned a corner in her car when a stranger gave her the scare of her life. Griffith said she was about to park her car at Bumbershoot when a man started pounding on her vehicle.

"He said also that I almost ran him over, which I didn't understand because he was behind the car," she said.

Griffith said when the man's temper flared, she got out of her car to see whether he'd done any damage to her Prius.

"I said, 'Look at my plate. Don't you see I'm from out of state? Cut me some slack,"' Griffith said. "So I took out my cell phone to take a photo. And I walked toward him to take the picture (of him), at which point he turned around and pepper sprayed me."

Griffith was blinded by the pain.

"It was like being on fire. It was excruciating," she said, adding she tried to hold her stomach as she fell to the ground. "I wasn't sure if he was poisoning me or my child."

Griffith grabbed a water bottle from her car, and people doused her with water as a woman held her up.

"The only thing I could say to her was, 'I'm pregnant. I'm pregnant.' And I didn't know what was on my face," said Griffith.

After an ambulance trip and her hours-long stay at Swedish Medical Center, she was assured that her face and baby will be OK. But the tears keep coming.

"It was really cruel, and I don't feel that I did anything that was so terrible to deserve this," she said.

Griffith contacted Seattle police.

The man ran from the scene, but Griffith's cell phone photo image remains. The man was also captured leaving Seattle Center by surveillance cameras.

Griffith hopes someone will recognize the man and call police.