A different route takes man on a lifesaving mission
Led by a ‘feeling,’ Dobie grad saves man in house fire that killed wife
Cedric Washington has no real explanation for why he turned onto Teton, a street in south Houston that leads into his grandmother’s neighborhood. It doesn’t make sense to go that way, the 19-yearold said, because it takes longer and offers no other advantage.
Yet some impulse told him to turn as he headed for her house Monday night, so he yielded to it. Minutes later, an elderly man whom Washington did not know was alive because of it.
“It was just a feeling,” Washington said. “That’s all I can say. It was God leading me that way.”
Night was approaching as he turned into the neighborhood of modest brick homes, between Bellfort and South Loop 610. As soon as he did, he saw smoke and flames coming from a house in the 4700 block. Washington stopped his car, jumped out and ran to the garage door, which neighbors were in the process of knocking down.
“There’s somebody in there,” one of the neighbors yelled. Washington did not hesitate, dropping to his knees as he entered the burning home through the garage. Black smoke was everywhere. He felt his way along, crawling toward the den. He heard nothing but the sound of burning wood.
Washington wasn’t sure who he was looking for or where they might be. But as he reached out, he felt something. He grabbed his phone and used the flashlight feature to see an old man sitting in a chair, apparently asleep.
“I shook him and said, ‘We have to get out of there,’ ” Washington said in an interview Tuesday. “He said OK, and I dragged him to the garage.”
The elderly man, 75-year-old Malcolm Mitchell, said that his
wife was still in the house. Washington wanted to go back in but was stopped by others. Coughing and choking, his eyes burning, Washington likely would have never reached Helen Mitchell, 74, who was disabled. She died in the blaze
Mitchell was taken to the hospital in critical condition, with smoke inhalation and burns to his head, authorities said. It had not been determined Tuesday what caused the fire.
Despite his efforts to save the home’s occupants, Washington said he does not think of himself as a hero.
“I feel like God sent me there to save that man,” Washington said. “I just look at it like it’s a good deed — something that I hope somebody would do for me some day.”
Washington, a recent graduate of Dobie High School in Pasadena, works two full-time jobs, a cashier at Wal-Mart and assistant manager of Jack In The Box. He said he has always felt the urge to help others, which led him to create a website several years ago to encourage young men barely older than himself. He lives in the Cloverland neighborhood of south Houston and said he plans to apply to a local police force when he turns 21.
“That has always been my dream job,” he said.
As far as Michael Mitchell is concerned, Washington would be an ideal candidate. The couple’s son said that Washington showed little concern for his own welfare as he stepped up to help strangers.
“He risked his life to save my father,” Mitchell said. “It’s a debt that can’t be repaid.”
Washington was treated and released from a nearby hospital after treatment for mild smoke inhalation. He returned to the Mitchells’ home later that evening to see how their family was coping with the tragedy and to show his respects for the deceased woman.
Recognized by some there as the young man who had saved Malcolm Mitchell, the son thanked him profusely
“Had it not been for him, I would have lost my parents,” Mitchell said.
The next day, Washington did not have much time to reflect on his actions. Nor was he too interested in basking in praise. He had to get ready to go to work.