Police Officer Rescues Students in Grave Danger with Act of Brute Force
Everybody knows that in the duel between man and machine, humans don’t stand a chance of coming out on top.
Tell that to one heroic police officer who has been honored for his bravery in taking on a rolling SUV to save lives.
It was a routine day on Dec. 16, 2019, and Bridgeport, Connecticut, police officer Carlos Carmo Jr., a resource officer assigned to Harding High School, was outside the school at dismissal time.
Then he saw the black SUV go coasting by, according to WTIC-TV.
“I saw the car driving by me with no driver and basically a passenger and somebody in the back seat just freaking out,” he said.
Situational awareness kicked in.
“I saw the car was heading towards a barrier and heading towards a group of kids and I ran towards it as best I could,” he said.
Ideally, the students would realize an SUV was aimed at them and move. But they were in a headphone-induced state of not caring what happened around them.
“The kids actually, they basically they all had headphones on, and I was screaming at them,” Carmo said, according to WABC-TV. “They basically didn’t even didn’t even hear me, and I only think they knew what was going when it was over.”
“I knew if I didn’t get that car to stop it at least four or five kids would get hit by that car,” he said.
Thank you Officer Carlos Carmo Jr. for your quick thinking!#Bridgeport #RunawayCar #HeroicAct #Hero #BPTFinest #BPTProud https://t.co/b7PrFegnDx
— Bridgeport Police (@bptpolice) December 23, 2019
There were two elderly passengers in the vehicle, which had somehow slipped out of park .
“One of them managed to open the door. That gave him the leverage,” said Armando J. Perez, Bridgeport Chief of Police.
Carmo grabbed the right rear door frame and tried to use his body strength to slow the drifting vehicle.
“My adrenaline basically kicked in at that point,” Carmo explained. “I used my strength while dragging my feet along the ground, pavement before the SUV could collide with anyone or anything. I was just thinking in my mind to say, ‘I got to find a way to stop this.’”
He did, which is why he was honored by the community for his work.
“Now we go through a lot of scenarios, but that’s not a scenario they teach us in the Academy,” he said, according to WABC. “That’s just one of those things where your instinct kicks in and you basically do what you gotta do to keep these kids safe.”
Perez called Carmo “an example to all of the police officers in this department.”
Carmo said it was a day on the job.
“I don’t think I did anything spectacular or special,” he said. “I work at a great department with great officers and any one of them would be able to stop that car.”
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