Officer Honored For Saving Teen After Near-Fatal Crash

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- A Twin Cities community is honoring a sergeant who helped save a teenager after a near fatal accident.

Charlie Rademacher, 17, was critically injured one year ago after his car rolled on a county highway in Cologne. He was thrown from the vehicle.

"It was scary," Rademacher's father, also named Charlie, said.

"Every organ in my body was bruised," Charlie said.

Looking at him today, you wouldn't even know what he's been through.

"If I would have laid there for ten more minutes I would have bled out," Charlie said. "If he wouldn't have saw my car flipped over I wouldn't be here."

"He" being Sergeant Lance Pearce. Sgt. Pearce had driven that section of County Road 51 many times in his 20 years in law enforcement and knew the tire tracks he saw on the highway Easter Morning of last year were new.

He looked in the ditch to find Charlie's empty car.

"I went looking for him and I found him 100 feet from the car," Sgt. Pearce said.

On Tuesday, Sgt. Pearce was honored with a Life Saving Award by the Carver County Sheriff's Office. It was handed to him by Charlie, welcomed with a standing ovation by members of the community.

"I'm appreciative obviously but I feel it's just my calling, my duty that any cop would have done," he said.

Charlie's family says they still don't know exactly what caused the accident. Charlie says he just bought a new car and now he always makes sure to wear his seatbelt.