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| Heart attack victim thanks officers |
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9/12/2014
By Tom Marshall
Senior Advocate writer
Louis Cundiff calls the two law enforcement officers who helped save his life “unsung heroes.”
Cundiff was behind the wheel of his 2007 Dodge 1500 pickup June 28 when he had a heart attack while driving near the Menifee County line.
The Means resident now hopes to personally thank the officers who helped save his life—Montgomery County Sheriff’s Det./Sgt. Ralph Charles and Kentucky State Police Trooper Jason Brown.
They performed CPR on Cundiff until an ambulance arrived.
“They’re the greatest,” Cundiff said. “Definitely.”
Cundiff’s girlfriend, Judy Wilson, recalls that the incident occurred on a Saturday as they were headed back home with groceries along U.S. 460. They were near Lovely Cemetery about 1 p.m. when Cundiff suddenly slumped in the driver’s seat.
Wilson grabbed the wheel and pulled the truck off to the right off the roadway. At first, Wilson feared that Cundiff was dead.
Charles and his son were also headed to Menifee County and were trailing Cundiff’s vehicle when he noticed it traveling erratically.
Charles had his son pull in behind the truck on the side of the road. When Charles got to the truck he realized Cundiff was having a heart attack and quickly began performing CPR.
His son called 911.
Wilson said she knows CPR, but was in such shock seeing Louis helpless that she doesn’t believe she could have done it on her own.
As Charles was applying CPR several vehicles slowed down, but kept on going. That is until another off duty officer, Jason Brown of the KSP, stopped to aid Charles.
They worked on Cundiff for about 10 minutes until an ambulance arrived, Charles said. All the while Cundiff was gasping for air, his girlfriend said.
Wilson said she was screaming and praying the whole time.
“I said, ‘God help him,’” she remembers.
Like Cundiff, Wilson is thankful that Charles was there when her boyfriend suddenly collapsed behind the wheel.
“Thank God that guy was behind us,” Wilson said. “He’d have never made it.”
Cundiff was transported to St. Joseph Hospital in Lexington, where doctors induced a therapeutic hypothermic coma, in which the body is cooled at the hospital to improve chances for a full recovery.
Had the officers, EMS and doctors not acted quickly and induced the coma, Cundiff said there was chance he could have been left brain dead, if he survived.
“They said it was a 50-50 chance that if I came out of it I would be a vegetable—brain damaged—if I came out of it at all,” Cundiff said.
Cundiff had two stints installed in his heart and was released six days later.
Since then he has been back at work as a commercial truck driver for Russ Trucking, which operates a terminal in Georgetown hauling parts for Toyota.
He called the Advocate Sept. 3, shortly after the paper went to press, to discuss his miraculous recovery.
Cundiff said he doesn’t remember a whole lot about what happened, but does know Charles and Brown deserve credit for helping save his life.
“I would like to shake their hands and tell them I really appreciate what they did,” he said. “It saved my life. It was a miracle they were there and did what they did. They’re unsung heroes.”
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