By VERNON ROBISON
Moapa Valley Progress
Local Metro police officers were recognized last week for coming to the aid of two young girls who were seriously injured in an auto accident last summer on Interstate 15.
Officers Troy Benson and Chris Kohntopp attended the Clark County Board of County Commissioners meeting on Tuesday, January 16 where each was presented with a proclamation honoring their work in the incident.
The presentation was made by County Commissioner Marilyn Kirkpatrick who gave a brief statement praising the two men at the meeting.
“What happened that day on I-15 was super heroic,” Kirkpatrick said.
The incident occurred on June 24 last year in the heat of a day when temperatures were well over 100 degrees. The two officers were first on the scene of a rollover accident on the interstate. The vehicle involved had five passengers, all of whom needed to be tranported to the hospital.
But two of them, young girls, had been ejected from the vehicle in the crash and needed immediate help. A 14 year old girl had suffered possible brain injuries and a twelve year old girl had sustained a partial amputation.
Mercy Air was called but it was almost an hour before the helicopter was expected to arrive on the scene.
Kohntopp went immediately to work tending to the girl with the apparent brain injury. Benson began assessing the injuries of the other girl who was conscious but had gone into shock.
Benson, who is trained and certified as an Emergency Medical Technician (EMT) applied an LVMPD CAT tourniquet to the girl’s arm to stop the bleeding. This action apparently saved the girl’s life, according to Kirkpatrick’s statement.
Both patients were airlifted to UMC hopital in Las Vegas and both survived the incident.
Kirkpatrick expressed the deepest appreciation to the officers for the service. ‘
“We ask our first responders to do way more today than they have ever done at any other time; whether it is mental health or EMT services, or whether it is serving hot dogs at community events,” Kirkpatrick said. “They are doing it all and we want to make sure that we recognise them.”
In an interview last week, Overton Resident Section Sergeant Bret Empey praised the two officers for the efforts that they had made in being prepared for such circumstances.
“In a rural area like this, we recognize that we may be called upon to do any number of things,” Empey said. “Troy (Benson) has taken it on as extra work to have that medical training so that he can function in these types of situations.”
Empey also praised the local volunteer fire departments who included the Metro officers in their medical training as well as supplying and stocking the police vehicles with the necessary medical bags.
