Tacoma officers save drowning teenage girl, body camera shows

TACOMA, Wash. — Newly released body camera footage shows three Tacoma Police Department (TPD) officers jumping into a lake to save a teenager from drowning.

The incident happened on Monday, April 8th at Wapato Lake.

According to TPD, the officers were in a nearby parking lot near the intersection of Sheridan Avenue and 72nd Street when police received a call about a 15-year-old girl who was on the verge of drowning at the lake.

“[Officers] ran to the scene and saw the juvenile in the water 20 to 30 feet from the shoreline,” TPD said in a statement. “Three officers entered the water, one diving under the surface in full police gear to reach the juvenile and push them toward another officer.”

Body camera footage shows that offices struggled to reach the victim in such muddy, murky conditions. Despite this, Officer Steve O'Neal managed to reach the victim within 15 seconds of entering the lake. He told KOMO News it was a difficult situation.

“There’s no training scenario I’ve been through to just run into a lake, but I know if it was my family or my daughter, that’s what I would be doing, so going in there was just the instinct," he noted. "I had no idea how difficult it was to move somebody out of water, while you’re in water, so I just remember playing with my kids in the pool, and getting underneath and hitting the ground, and jumping up to push them up, so that’s what worked."

From there, several officers worked as a team to get the teenager to the shore.

Paramedics with the TPD also responded to the scene and the teenager was taken to a local hospital, where she is said to be in stable condition.