MIAMI-DADE COUNTY, Fla. – Two Miami-Dade police officers were honored Monday for saving the life of a court bailiff.
The bailiff collapsed in the courthouse lobby Dec. 10, suffering from heart failure. Luckily, the officers were able to revive him.
"It's the best holiday gift anyone could receive is a second chance at life," bailiff Ed Buchanan said.
Buchanan has been a bailiff at the courthouse since 1996. But Monday was his first day back since being rushed away in an ambulance.
"I really don't remember anything from that morning, but I was told as I came through the lobby (that) I collapsed," he said.
Officer Stuart Perkins said a security guard told him that someone collapsed in the lobby. Perkins and Officer Maria Spell didn't know at first that it was Buchanan who they were rushing to help.
The officers said they took turns shocking him, giving CPR and doing chest compressions.
"I feel extra close to these two, like spirits I guess," Buchanan said. "They were in the right place at the right time."
Perkins and Spell humbly accepted awards for their life-saving measures that were taken that day. Doctors told Buchanan that if it weren't for them, he would not have survived.
"It's bittersweet, because I don't do what I do for a living to get recognized," Perkins said.
"It is so beautiful to take a moment and to pause and to thank and to honor those who truly make the holiday spirit what it's all about," Judge Carroll Kelly said. "Helping each other, saving each other and looking out for each other, and that's what our officers did. They saved his life."
The next time Buchanan returns to the courthouse, he said he will be in uniform to return to work.
"These are the family of my soul," Buchanan said. "I love everyone that I work with."