Officers receive medals for rescue
Four police officers who helped rescue a young child from an overturned vehicle submerged in ice-cold water received a medal of valor for their actions.
Sgt. Jed White, Cpl. Joe Coody, Officer Travis Luper and Officer Ashton Burden were awarded medals on Oct. 23, according to a press release issued by Capt. Derek Spicer of the Siloam Springs Police Department.
Luper also received a lifesaving award during the ceremony for a separate incident.
The medals of valor were awarded for an incident that occurred on Jan. 3, when the four officers responded to an accident in the area of U.S. Highway 412 and Main Street where a vehicle was overturned and submerged in the fountain by the welcome to Siloam Springs sign, the press release states. The driver was out of the vehicle, but the driver’s 11-year-old son was still trapped inside, the release states.
The officers braved the 35-degree temperature and entered the freezing water to save the boy, the release states. A plan was developed to flip the vehicle on its side in order to free the child, the release states. In order to accomplish the task, some of the officers were required to submerge themselves in the water, it states.
The Siloam Springs Fire Department also played a major role in rescuing the child from vehicle, according to Spicer.
“When they showed up, they immediately began to try to extricate the child from the truck,” Spicer said.
When the boy was finally freed from the vehicle, firefighters took the boy to an ambulance for transport, he said.
The driver of the vehicle, Michael Guest, was transported to the Siloam Springs Regional Hospital for treatment before being arrested in connection with driving while intoxicated and endangering the welfare of a minor, according to an article published in the Siloam Springs Herald Leader on Jan. 6.
The boy was also transported to SSRH, but was then transferred to Saint Francis Hospital in Tulsa, Okla, according to the Jan. 6 story. The child, Tyner Levi Hammett, 11, died on Jan. 8, at Saint Francis Hospital, according to a Jan. 13 article in the Siloam Springs Herald Leader.
Guest was later charged with negligent homicide, according to a Feb. 12 article in the Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
Luper received the lifesaving award for a medical call that he was dispatched to on Sept. 16, involving a male with a cut hand, according to a second press release from the SSPD. Luper assessed the situation and determined that the man had a severe arterial bleed and applied a tourniquet to the individual’s upper arm, which stopped the bleeding and saved the man’s life.