NATIONAL CITY, Calif. -- Police are looking for a convicted sex offender accused of trying to kidnap a girl in National City Wednesday afternoon.

The incident happened shortly before 4:30 p.m. on the corner of Q Avenue and 16th Street

Thirteen-year-old Guadalupe Perez said she was walking home from National City Middle School when a man in a dark gray Nissan Quest van jumped out and tried to grab her. She told police the man held a knife to her neck and tried to get her into the van.

"He told me, 'Get in the car or I'm going to cut you,' and then I gave him an elbow hit and then I screamed. He let me go and he went back in the car and I went home," Guadalupe told 10News.

She said she remembered a recent kidnapping attempt in Chula Vista where a girl screamed and ran to get away from a kidnapper.

"I'm like, 'This is really happening,' and then I thought of the girl that almost... and it worked," said Guadalupe.

She suffered a small cut to her hand but is otherwise OK.

"I just think what would happen if I did do what he said. I might have ended up in a lake somewhere dead, cut in pieces. I don't know, I'm just grateful I did what I did," said Guadalupe.

Guadalupe gave police a partial license plate linked to registered sex offender Leonard Earl Scroggins, 32, from Napa.

Police are searching for Scroggins, whose crimes include rape.

He is listed as a transient on the Megan's Law website.