A police officer in Long Island, New York saved a baby girl whose mother was driving along the expressway “high on drugs.”
Suffolk County Officer Joe Goss says he leaped into the woman’s moving car after she refused to pull over on the Long Island Expressway in Manorville.
The 10-year vet says this night was unlike any other he’s had over the course of his career.
He says 37-year-old Maria Lagatta was travelling 20 miles per hour on the LIE. Goss immediately noticed she was high on drugs. She had her 22-month old toddler in the back seat.
Goss says he employed a maneuver that officers typically use to slow traffic down to make conditions safer in scenarios like this. He told local media that a Good Samaritan, another driver who happened to pass by at the time, was the unsung hero in all this.
He put his hazard lights on and was able to slow down traffic so that Lagatta’s vehicle wouldn’t get hit while he went to stop her, NBC 4 reported.
She eventually slowed down to 5 miles an hour. Goss jumped into the passenger-side window, got his hand on the shifter and forced the car into park.
“All your training says, don’t go into a moving car, and I didn’t like the idea of it, but when the window of opportunity was there, and her speed is so slow, I jumped at it,” Goss said.
The mother was taken into custody and faces numerous charges. Police notified Child Protective Services and released Lagatta’s daughter to a relative.
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