On Sept. 4, an inmate at the Alexandria jail wrapped a T-shirt around his neck, wedged the other end between the wall and a light fixture and tried to hang himself in his jail cell, a sheriff is spokesman said.
The inmate was in a private cell on the jail’s second floor after getting in a fight. Once inside, he covered the cell’s camera so deputies couldn’t see him. As a result, Deputies Gerald Resseguie and Scott Petrini conducted extra checks on the inmate.
It was during one of those checks that they found the inmate hanging by his T-shirt and rushed inside. They quickly pulled the shirt from its wedge and lowered him to his bunk. He was breathing, but unconscious. He later fully revived.
For their actions, Resseguie and Petrini were among five deputies to receive Life Saving Awards from the Alexandria Chamber of Commerce last week.
The other three helped save an inmate’s life on Jan. 23, 2008, the spokesman said.
Around 2:19 a.m. Deputy Larry Richardson was making a routine check of the inmate receiving center when he discovered an inmate inside a cell who was barely breathing.
Deputies Chris O’Dell and Ricky Hart Jr. joined Richardson when Richardson called for medical support. The three splashed water on the inmate but he didn’t wake up, and when O’Dell checked for a pulse, he couldn’t find one.
O’Dell then grabbed a defibrillator and applied three times, to no avail. Finally, Richardson and Hart applied CPR, and the inmate began to breathe.
