Miranda Alam
Officer Joshua Irwin bends down to speak to Devin Ray, a toddler whose life he saved, during a commendation ceremony at Metro Police headquarters on Wednesday, Jan. 15, 2020.
Thursday, Jan. 16, 2020 | 2 a.m.
Metro Police Officer Joshua Irwin was the first to arrive at the chaotic scene in a Las Vegas neighborhood. Devin Ray had fallen into a backyard pool and was now lying on the concrete ground, transmitting a weak pulse and collapsing into unconsciousness.
“I was beside myself,” said Sarahna Ray through tears, describing the traumatic event that left her 1-year-old son near death. “All I remember is (the officer) coming and saying, ‘OK, step back, I got it, now calm down.’”
After chest compressions, her little boy “kind of coughed and moved his eyes.”
Doctors credit Irwin’s efforts for saving Devin’s life, said Carla Alston, director of Metro Police’s public information office. On Wednesday afternoon, when Irvin received an award for his actions from Metro’s top brass, the boy accompanied him onstage.
“Aw, how precious,” a woman in the crowd was heard saying at Metro headquarters near downtown, where the ceremony is held quarterly. About 60 recipients were honored with 17 awards.
Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo and Undersheriff Kevin McMahill presided over the ceremony in a conference room. There were plenty of hugs, applause and photo opportunities.
Lombardo said it was an honor to reward the officers in front of their loved ones. “I truly appreciate everything you do,” he told them.
The same appreciation is true for the Ray family of Officer Irwin.
After the near-drowning, she tracked down Irwin. Eventually he came to visit Devin, and soon both families forged a friendship. “Their family is ours now, no matter what,” Ray said.
There are calls on Father’s Day, Mother’s Day, and the Irwin family surprised Devin last month with a Christmas gift. “I’m blessed to have them in my life,” Ray said.
Irwin plans to keep in touch with Devin and his parents in the future. “They want me in their life and I want him and their family in my life, too,” he said.
Lombardo said officers respond to roughly 3 million calls a year. Some of the recipients were honored for solving cases, such as a series of robberies or the theft of hundreds of firearms at a Las Vegas Strip property during a gun show.
Others honorees included:
• Officer Kelly Cannon for creating the state’s first “Critical Crash Response Outreach,” which trained about 180 community partners on how to aid those affected by serious crashes. Traffic fatalities decreased by about 25% in the last year.
• Detective Darryl McDonald, who Alston said, “you may have seen dancing in uniform with kids in the street or barbequing for area residents,” won a community award. The officer, with Metro’s office of community engagement, was also going to be honored as a “citizen of the month” by city of Las Vegas officials, Alston noted.
• Metro’s Special Investigation Section was credited for busting brothels “masquerading” as businesses. The section helped shut down several establishments, seizing about $2 million, and arresting many suspects in the “first ever” racketeering conviction for the unit.
• Glenn Davis, a forensic scientist with Metro, reconstructed a rusted .25-caliber gun found at the bottom of a lake, where it was ditched after a slaying some 11 years before. His efforts helped solve the cold case, Alston said.
• Officers Robert Grabowski and Hector Navarro distracted a suicidal man and took him into custody before he jumped from an overpass. A separate team of officers also saved a woman attempting to end her life at another bridge.
• Officer Eduardo Guardado applied a tourniquet on a stabbing victim, saving her life.
• Officer Christopher Bunting and Dr. Ross Seibel, a search and rescue volunteer, were honored for saving the life of a stabbing suspect who slashed his own throat.
• Sgt. Stephanie Ward and Capt. Kelly McMahill spent hundreds of hours compiling an after-action review of the Oct. 1, 2017, mass shooting.
• A trio of officers saved a gravely injured man who’d been beaten and left to die slumped on a fence.
• Sgt. Jeffrey Blum stopped an attack with a cane from a burglary suspect on an elderly victim.
• A group of officers was credited with stopping a domestic violence suspect who charged at them with a knife.
