Six University of St. Thomas Public Safety officers will be honored this week for their role in a rescue carried out along the steep banks of the Mississippi River a year ago.
Of the six, four are current St. Thomas officers and two are former officers. They located and then helped to rescue a young man in need of immediate medical care.
After locating the man on the east shore of the river, not far from the university’s St. Paul campus, St. Thomas Public Safety and St. Paul Police officers formed a human chain and passed the man up the rough cliffs to an ambulance, which transported him to the hospital for life-saving care.
The four Public Safety officers who will receive the award are Mike Barrett, Wells Farnham, Terry Pretzloff and Josh Suchy. The former St. Thomas officers are Bryan Hamilton and Brett Nyman. Barrett holds two degrees from St. Thomas, a 1995 bachelor’s and a 2004 master’s. Nyman received his bachelor’s here in 2006, and this year Farnham received a master’s and Hamilton received a bachelor’s.
The Chief’s Awards will be presented at 2 p.m. Thursday at the St. Paul Police Department’s Western District Office.
