By SDCN Staff
Santee, CA–Thanks to the quick-thinking actions of an off-duty Sheriff’s Dispatcher and responding Sheriff’s Deputies, a missing child who had wandered onto a freeway in Santee was safely rescued.
On March 9, just before 4:30 p.m., the Sheriff’s Communications Center received a report about an 11-year-old autistic boy who had gone missing from a supermarket located in the 9600 block of Mission Gorge Road. According to the reporting party, the child, who is non-verbal, was with his family when he ran out of the store. His family called the Sheriff’s Office when they could not find him.
Within minutes, deputies from the Santee Sheriff’s Station began to look for the missing child. A Sheriff’s ASTREA helicopter also began making announcements to the public in the area about the child.
Around 5:15 p.m., off-duty Sheriff’s Dispatcher Shiloh Corbet was driving home from work when she spotted someone matching the missing child’s description running along Mast Boulevard near the State Route 52 on-ramp. She immediately called the Sheriff’s Communications Center to report the sighting. While on the phone, Corbet noticed the child running up the freeway on-ramp. She immediately stopped her car and followed the child. By the time she got to the freeway’s shoulder, the child had crossed the westbound lanes of SR-52 and was standing in the center divider.
Knowing the child’s name from the information given to her by the Sheriff’s Communications Center, Corbet called to him to stay where he was at for his own safety. The entire time, she was relaying information on the phone to an on-duty Sheriff’s Dispatcher Supervisor, who was directing deputies to the scene.
Once deputies arrived, they parked on the street below the SR-52 overpass. They could see the child at the top of the steep concrete embankment. Deputies tried to contact him, but the child moved away from them.
When deputies saw him start moving towards the center divider guardrail, they ran up the embankment to try and stop him. The child hopped the guardrail and started running along the busy freeway. Without hesitation, Deputies Cody Green and Michael Moser jumped over the guardrail and raced to catch up to the child. The deputies were able to get him off the freeway. He was soon reunited with his family. No one was hurt.
The San Diego County Sheriff’s Office credited Sheriff’s Dispatcher Shiloh Corbet, Deputies Cody Green, and Michael Moser, as well as the Santee Sheriff’s Station, Lakeside Sheriff’s Substation, Sheriff’s ASTREA, Sheriff’s Communications Center, and several Good Samaritans, for working together to find the missing child and getting him to safety.
