It’s not the kind of call any officer wants to receive.
But when Liberty County Sheriff ’s Deputy Anthony Gallob heard the dispatchers’ report of a child under respiratory distress while on patrol early Thursday morning, he moved into action. His swift response is being credited with trying to save the life of a 3-month-old girl.
Gallob said when the call came on the radio, he was about a mile from the incident’s location at Live Oak Mobile Home Park.
“I got there and walked into the house and observed the child laying on the floor in the far-back bedroom,” he said, adding that the child’s father had started resuscitation efforts based on the instruction he received from the 911 operator. “I took over CPR and continued CPR until firefighter (Brian) Darby arrived on scene.”
Gallob said the child was unresponsive and had no signs of a heartbeat but still felt a bit warm when he started life-saving techniques he had been trained to do before becoming a LCSO deputy two years ago.
Gallob said he worked together with Darby, and soon, emergency medical technicians from Liberty County Emergency Medical Service were on scene.
“I told him to keep doing what he was doing,” Darby said, adding he rushed to retrieve extra equipment after evaluating the situation.
Darby said the two kept performing CPR and checking the child’s vital signs until EMS took over.
EMTs Trey Johnson, Crystal Hensler, Tracy Rogers and Bob Heffley sprang into action and, with the continued assistance of Gallob and Darby, rushed the child to Liberty Regional Medical Center, where a team of emergency response personnel was waiting to assist, LRMC Director of Marketing Rene’ Harwell said.
“First responders and EMS both praised Deputy Gallob’s quick response in this situation, and I firmly believe this little girl would never had a chance had it not been for him,” Gallob’s supervisor, Lt. Sascha Krumnow, wrote in a letter to Chief Deputy Jon Long and Sheriff Steve Sikes.
“It’s just an honor and a privilege to have men and women like the ones standing here today,” Sikes said during a brief get-together with the rescuers. “It was an extraordinary thing to do. Sometimes, we get a lot of bad press when things might go wrong ... it is very seldom we get this good news and be proud of each other, and I am proud of each and every person here today. I am exceptionally proud of my deputy. He did a great job in a very precarious situation. He stepped up to the plate and did what he was trained to do.”
“It’s a good situation for the county when we get the level of cooperation that we do between the sheriff’s office, Liberty EMS and the fire department,” Long added. “They are a great bunch of folks that do what Anthony Gallob did, but they do it every day. It just so happened that Gallob was in the right spot to be the first one to get to the scene, but we appreciated the relationship we have with the EMTs and the assis- tance they rendered to us and the job they do every day.”
Unfortunately, Long said Tuesday, the child died in the hospital Monday evening. Autopsy results still were being evaluated to determine the cause of death.