A Hampton police officer was recognized by the City Council last week for two separate life-saving acts over an eight-day period.
Mason Lewis was dispatched July 13 to the scene of an automobile accident and discovered a female in a wrecked car with her arm severed below the elbow. As the proclamation issued by the council noted, the officer immediately and successfully applied a tourniquet to the victim’s arm, which slowed the loss of blood and stabilized her until Henry County emergency medical personnel arrived.
Lewis’ action “directly prevented the loss of life,” according to the proclamation.
Hampton police chief Derrick Austin stated that the wreck stemmed from a domestic dispute originating in Spalding County. The victim’s ex-husband ran her off the road and then attacked her with a machete, cutting off her arm.
“That’s not something we see every day,” the chief acknowledged. “But he [Lewis] was Johnny-on-the-spot. The EMTs were, too.”
The assailant was arrested in Spalding County the next day, Austin said, and is in the Henry County Jail.
Lewis and all of his fellow officers are trained in the use of a tourniquet mainly for their own injuries. “If you get shot, you can apply it to yourself,” said Austin. “Everybody has them in the same place on their uniforms, so if another officer is shot, you know where his or her tourniquet is.”
Another area in which police officers are now trained is administering NARCAN, which is used to help reverse an opioid overdose. Lewis got a call July 21 and was dispatched to a scene where he encountered someone unconscious as a result of an overdose. He was able to use NARCAN to successfully bring the victim back to consciousness and reverse the effects of the drugs, according to the proclamation.
“Unfortunately, we have had to become trained and supplied with NARCAN because of the number of overdose cases we get,” said Austin. “Four or five years ago we were not.”
Lewis, 26, has been with the Hampton police almost two years and previously served in Spalding County.
The victims of both incidents are alive today, Austin said.
