Phoenix Officer and His Wife Help Rescue Family from Canal

A Phoenix police sergeant taking his wife on a ridealong helped rescue a family after their SUV crashed into a canal last month.

“We heard the emergency call kick in for people into the canal, vehicle into the canal,” said Sgt. Jason Malecki. Malecki was closest to the scene but wasn’t alone; his wife Allison was in the patrol car with him. In an instant, both Maleckis’ became first responders, AZ Family reports.

“Jumped out of the car, and she jumped out of the car,” said Sgt. Malecki. “He’s got kids and everything in there, so we’re going to grab some rope and see if we can get them out,” you can hear Sgt. Malecki saying in the body camera footage.

“I’m going to need your help here because I don’t know what I’m going to get into and how I’m going to get these people out,” he recalled. Two adults and a 3-year-old girl were inside the car. Allison Malecki had never seen anything like this before.

Body-cam footage shows Malecki grabbing the rope rushing over to assist other officers. He grabbed a crying child, quickly passing her over to Allison.

"Just being able to have her there to hand the baby off to – I was handing her off to someone safe and then that gave my attention to help the other officers," Sgt. Malecki told Fox 10 .