An officer from the Mesquite Police Department in Nevada saved a 3-year-old boy from choking on a piece of candy last week, and it was all caught on camera after his body camera was accidentally turned on during the incident.
The boy, identified as Damian Valencia, was choking on a Jawbreaker when his parents rushed him into a grocery store and had the clerk call 911, according to ABC News.
Off-duty officer Quinn Averett was less than a block away when the call came in. Averett raced into the store, turned the boy upside down over his knee and began a kind of reverse-Heimlich maneuver, with the officer’s body camera capturing the moment the Jawbreaker popped free. Days later, an emotional reunion occurred at the police station, with the boy’s family stopping by to thank the man who saved Damian’s life.
“I cried a little bit because it really touched me, because I have children of my own,” Averett told ABC News of the reunion.
Valencia’s family will see Averett again in January when the officer is scheduled to receive an award from the city council.
