Resuscitation on Broadway

By LAURIE STUART
Posted 10/11/21

MONTICELLO, NY — It was a routine patrol until Monticello Police Office Justin Dawson observed a driver slumped over in his car, sitting at a green light on Broadway and Bank Street around 5 …

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Resuscitation on Broadway

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MONTICELLO, NY — It was a routine patrol until Monticello Police Office Justin Dawson observed a driver slumped over in his car, sitting at a green light on Broadway and Bank Street around 5 p.m. on Thursday, September 30.

“At first I thought he was just looking at his phone. Cars were going around him, I drove by slowly. Something did not seem right. I turned around,” Dawson said.

“All I can say is that P.O. Dawson was very alert while on patrol,” Police Lt. Mark Johnstone wrote in an email. “When he checked the driver, he saw he was wasn’t breathing and he requested EMS assistance immediately. I got there on scene to assist and checked for a neck pulse, [and]  there wasn’t one.”

The operator of the vehicle, a 62-year-old Monticello man, was in cardiac arrest.

“We dragged the driver to the rear of the car and started CPR right in the middle of the road on Broadway. After a few minutes, we got the driver to start taking a few breaths on his own. Mobile Medic arrived and the driver showed a faint pulse on their monitor. We turned it over to them and by the time he was leaving in the ambulance they had him conscious,” Johnson wrote.

Dawson said, “When we pulled him from the car I thought ‘This guy is in trouble.’ And then the training kicks in. You go into autopilot.”

When complimented on his heroic action, Dawson responded, “I was just doing my job. It was unique. You don’t expect someone to be in cardiac arrest in the middle of Broadway.”

“It was a great team effort,” Johnstone said. “The CPR helped until Mobile Medic got there. If Dawson hadn’t noticed there was problem and CPR wasn’t started when we did it, [it] probably would have been a different outcome. Monticello Fire Department was also on scene and did a great job too.”

Monticello Police Department, cardiac arrest, CPR, Mobile Medic, Monticello Fire Department

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