He’s trying to explain why some police calls linger, so you might be stringing Christmas lights one day when the scene returns.
Martin can still see the dog lunge, then its body jerk from the bullet. He can still see steam rising from the boy’s scalp.
The 7-year-old is curled on the deck, offering a few faint words. Martin is pressing his police shirt to staunch the bleeding.
He lives with this scene now.
“I’ve been thinking about the child’s injuries and the feeling this family must have. How would I feel if it was my child?”
It’s been seven weeks since Derek Heckler’s son lay bleeding outside a Pasadena home. That evening, Martin held steady the boy’s neck. He spoke softly to the child as sirens screamed toward the 3400 block of Barnsley Court.
“That man’s a hero,” Heckler said. “If he hadn’t acted the way he did, my son would be dead.”
Martin says instinct took over in those few frantic moments. The 17-year veteran with the Anne Arundel County Police Department credits his firearms training:
First — assess the situation.
The call came from dispatch: an “unknown disturbance.” He arrived to find the front door open. There was blood on the kitchen floor; commotion from the back deck.
Prepare for the worst.
The sliding-glass doors were closed. Outside, two American bulldogs lunged at a woman. She curled over something — a child, bleeding from the head and neck.
Stay calm.
Martin feared for their lives. He met the woman’s eyes. She lowered her head.
Breathe.
He was taught to focus through disruption. In training, he learned to run two miles, then stagger through a gassed building, step to the line and aim.
Martin drew his gun.
Steady.
There was no other choice. He fired through the glass.
One dog fell. Martin stepped out. Then a bark — the second dog lunged at him, he said. He shot again. The dog fell away, then fled inside.
Martin bent toward the woman and child. He called for aid and removed his shirt to wrap the boy’s bleeding head.
Healing
Dakota Heckler suffered fractures to his skull, jaw and pelvic bone. Rescuers recovered part of the boy’s scalp. It was reattached by doctors at Johns Hopkins Children’s Center in Baltimore.
The boy spent 11 days there, undergoing four surgeries. Staples were removed from his head on Christmas Eve. Skin grafts will be done in the coming weeks.
“If the police officer hadn’t acted so quickly, this could have been devastating,” Derek Heckler said. “It’s hard to look at my son and see the pain he’s in. I’d rather do that than visit a grave site.”
Dakota lives with his father in Baltimore County and was visiting an aunt on Dec. 1. He was unfamiliar to the dogs in the house and they attacked. The two dogs pursued as the woman and child fled outside. There, she curled over top Dakota, shielding him until Martin arrived.
Martin and two other officers visited the boy in the hospital. They brought coloring books and crayons, a toy helicopter and monster truck. Dakota just finished surgery when the officers stood bedside to offer encouragement.
Now, a life-size Superman poster hangs in Dakota’s bedroom. The boy wears Superman Band-Aids. The doctors, nurses and police officers are all calling on their “little Superman” to be strong.
There are days when Martin considers his actions.
No officer wants to shoot, he said. But there was too much blood to hesitate. Dakota couldn’t survive more.
“It’s sad. These were family pets,” he said. “They probably had them for years. What if it was my dogs?”
His actions have been praised by Dakota’s family. Their support and counseling have helped him live with the memory of the boy’s injuries.
Hours after the attack, Martin called the hospital to check Dakota’s condition.
Then he went home and gave his own son a hug.
(CapitalGazette.com - Jan 23, 2013)
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