MONTROSE, Colo.—A judge and two deputies were credited with saving the life of a man who screamed in pain and collapsed in a Montrose County courtroom.
County Judge John Mitchel and Deputies David Harrison and Don Bertorello summoned help and did chest compressions on the man, who quit breathing and had no pulse after apparently suffering a seizure Tuesday, the judge said.
The 50-year-old man was treated at a hospital, and Mitchel said he was told the man was released. Court officials would not release his name or say why he was in court.
Sheriff Rick Dunlap said the judge and deputies “went above and beyond” in helping the man.
“In this case, in my mind, they saved somebody’s life,” Dunlap said.
Mitchel said he heard “a horrendous, painful scream from the back of the courtroom,” looked up and saw a man in terrible pain.
“I remember yelling: ‘He’s having a seizure,’ and I ran down to him.”
Mitchel and the deputies, who were providing courthouse security, rushed to the man’s side, trying to calm him.
The seizure seemed to subside, but then the man’s eyes rolled back in his head, he quit breathing and his pulse vanished, Mitchel said.
Bertorello went to summon help and Harrison began doing chest compressions, but the man exhaled “like it was his last breath,” Mitchel said.
“I said, ‘Oh my God, I think we’ve lost him,'” Mitchel said, but he told Harrison to keep doing chest compressions until medical help arrived.
“All of a sudden there was a pulse,” Mitchel said. “It was a good, steady pulse, and he started breathing.”
