Hero Fund recognizes 17 people with Carnegie Medal for Heroism
The Carnegie Hero Fund is honored to recognize 17 individuals, including a 42-year-old man who disarmed a man with a pistol that entered a school in Pasadena, Texas; three men in Berlin, Massachusetts, who rescued a woman trapped beneath debris after a propane explosion leveled her home; and a 37-year-old truck driver who saved an injured 16-year-old girl from inside a burning charter bus following a multi-vehicle accident in Etna, Ohio.
All the men and women recognized today risked serious injury or death, or were killed, saving or attempting to save others in acts of extraordinary heroism. This is the Hero Fund’s fourth and final award announcement for 2025. Each individual will receive the Carnegie Medal for Heroism, North America’s highest honor for civilian heroism.
Among those saved, or attempted to be saved, by this quarter’s Carnegie Medal recipients were seven children, including a 10-year-old whose mother died helping to rescue him from drowning in a river in New Hampshire, and a man trapped inside a burning airplane that crash-landed upside down.
The Carnegie Medal is given throughout the U.S. and Canada to those who enter extreme danger while saving or attempting to save the lives of others. With this announcement, the Carnegie Medal has been awarded to 10,545 individuals since the inception of the Pittsburgh-based Fund in 1904. Each of the recipients or their survivors will receive a financial grant. Throughout the 121 years since the Fund was established by industrialist-philanthropist Andrew Carnegie, more than $45 million has been given in one-time grants, scholarship aid, death benefits, and continuing assistance.
The recipients are:
(The late) Christopher S. Copeland Amarillo, Texas
Brian Clemmer Berlin, Massachusetts
Dylan Clemmer Berlin, Massachusetts
Jonathan Golas Berlin, Massachusetts
Joshua A. Curtis, deceased Halifax, Massachusetts
Lance T. Jones Fernandina Beach, Florida
Melissa Bagley, deceased Fort Lynn, Massachusetts
Clayton E. Poindexter St. Louis
Mark Amoroso St. Louis
James Peasnall Tooele, Utah
Juan F. Lopez Hockley, Texas
William Anthony Rubio Franklin, Kentucky
Vincent Douglas Parr, deceased Lawrence, Massachusetts
James D.A. Badgley, deceased Picton, Ontario
Joshua Chieka Piedmont, Ohio
Michael E. Johnson Ligonier, Pennsylvania
Frederick L. Palmer Jr. New Alexandria, Pennsylvania
(The late) Christopher S. Copeland
During an Aug. 4, 2023, traffic stop in Amarillo, Texas, a 36-year-old man attempted to flee the scene. Police officer Steven Kennedy, 40, who had initiated the stop, chased the man into an alley and took him to the ground. During the struggle the man reached for Kennedy’s loaded pistol in its holster and threatened to kill Kennedy. By then, the late Christopher S. Copeland, a 52-year-old master framer at the time, had heard yelling and saw the struggle from his nearby apartment. Copeland made his way outside and saw the assailant grasping Kennedy’s gun. Kennedy attempted to keep the weapon in its holster while Copeland crouched beside him. Using both hands to grasp the assailant’s hand, Copeland twisted and pulled to remove it from the pistol. Before Copeland could secure the weapon, the assailant pulled the trigger and fired the pistol, the bullet grazing Kennedy’s thigh, inches from Copeland’s leg. Copeland remained engaged and, while Kennedy held down the assailant’s right hand, Copeland grabbed the pistol and handed it to the officer. The assailant continued to struggle as Kennedy and Copeland secured the assailant to the ground. Additional officers arrived nearly six minutes after Copeland first intervened; they arrested the assailant. The assailant pleaded guilty to attempted capital murder of a police officer and possession of a controlled substance. He was sentenced to 50 years in prison. Kennedy recovered after treatment at a hospital. Copeland had scrapes on his left hand and his knees were skinned. Although Copeland recovered from his injuries sustained in the rescue, he died two years later in an unrelated incident and will be receiving the Carnegie Medal posthumously.
Brian Clemmer, Dylan Clemmer, and Jonathan Golas
On April 14, 2023, Jill A. Christensen, 49, was asleep in her second-floor bedroom in her Berlin, Massachusetts, home when a propane explosion in the basement leveled her house. Christensen’s 79-year-old mother was in her bedroom on the first floor, directly above the explosion’s origin. Christensen awoke to being trapped under rubble, beneath a heavy roof support beam, and she screamed for help. A 46-year-old automobile repair shop owner, Brian Clemmer, and his 21-year-old son, Dylan Clemmer, a construction laborer, were in a neighboring home and ran to the scene with a 64-year-old neighbor. Where the house once stood was a pile of rubble and they heard Christensen screaming. Quality control manager Jonathan Golas, 37, also went to the scene. Clemmer and his son walked up the pile, stepping over a live, arcing power line knocked loose by the explosion. They reached the area near Christensen’s location where they punched and dug through the debris as flames burned about 15 feet away. As they dug, they spotted one of Christensen’s hands. They cleared the remaining debris until she was uncovered and saw she was pinned by the beam. Clemmer and Dylan tried to lift the beam but were unsuccessful. Golas approached the debris pile and said he could see a glow from flames encroaching on them from the rear of the property. Golas helped Clemmer and Dylan remove the beam after multiple tries, freeing Christensen. As Golas continued to hold the beam, Clemmer and Dylan lifted her from the bed as the flames continued to spread toward them. Golas discarded the beam and helped move Christensen toward the front of the pile of debris, away from the flames. About 35 seconds after the three men removed her from the rubble and moved to safety, a second explosion occurred, engulfing the structure in flames. Firefighters were unable to rescue Christensen’s mother, who was trapped inside and died at the scene. Christensen was not burned and went to a hospital for injuries suffered in the explosion. She recovered. Clemmer, Dylan, and Golas were not injured.
Joshua A. Curtis, deceased, and Lance T. Jones
Owen Curtis, 6, and his 9-year-old cousin, Raylynn Nelsen, were playing in shallow water at Fernandina Beach, Florida, on April 24, when a rip current suddenly pulled them into water at least 7 feet deep. As they struggled, Owen’s father, a 38-year-old craftsman, Joshua A. Curtis of Halifax, Massachusetts, saw what was happening from the beach and immediately went in after them. When he reached the children, he worked to keep them afloat and push them back toward shore. At some point, Curtis stopped swimming and continued drifting farther out with Owen on his back. Raylynn kept trying to make her way toward shore. On the beach, a bystander alerted 45-year-old sales consultant Lance T. Jones, a local who was nearby. He saw Raylynn about 300 feet from shore, ran into the water, and swam out to her. She grabbed him and briefly pulled him under, but once he calmed her, he was able to get her back to shallow water, where another bystander helped her the rest of the way to shore. Jones then turned back and swam out roughly 600 feet to reach Curtis and Owen. When he got to them, Curtis was facedown in the water. Owen grabbed onto Jones, pulling him under a few times, but Jones calmed him and turned Curtis onto his back. Jones pushed Owen a short distance toward shore, then swam Curtis forward to meet him, repeating this until rescue swimmers reached them about 200 feet from shore. Jones helped bring Owen in while the rescuers brought Curtis to the beach and began lifesaving efforts. The children were taken to the hospital as a precaution and released the same day with no injuries. Curtis was also taken to the hospital, but they could not resuscitate him; he had drowned. Jones was nearly exhausted and coughed up some water but was otherwise uninjured.
Melissa Bagley, deceased
On Aug. 15, 2023, 10-year-old Jonathan Bagley slipped off an exposed rock near a hiking trail and fell into a deep pool of the East Branch of the Pemigewasset River in Lincoln, New Hampshire. The water was cold and fast-moving because of the flow from Franconia Falls, and Jonathan struggled to stay above the surface. His mother, 44-year-old Melissa Bagley of Lynn, Massachusetts, and his 18-year-old brother immediately went in after him. Both went underwater several times. The brother later said the water was “freezing” and that he couldn’t touch the bottom. They grabbed Jonathan and pushed him toward a rock, where Jonathan’s sister and the brother’s partner pulled him out of the water. Meanwhile, the current swept Bagley downstream as the brother held onto a rock to keep himself in place. After finding her downstream, Jonathan’s father tried to revive Bagley with CPR, but she was unresponsive. He then returned to the pool and used a makeshift rope to pull Jonathan’s brother out. Jonathan and his brother went to the hospital. They were treated for minor injuries and released later that night. Emergency crews ultimately recovered Bagley. She had drowned.
Clayton E. Poindexter and Mark Amoroso
The pilot of a two-seat airplane, 71-year-old Michael Brenner, remained trapped inside the cockpit after a Dec. 8, 2024, crash-landing in which the plane came to rest upside down in a Columbia, Illinois, field. The force of the impact buried the plexiglass canopy of the cockpit about a foot deep in soft dirt. The plane’s engine area caught fire, and flames and smoke filled the cockpit. Brenner tried to use the plane’s fire extinguisher, but the flames were too intense. Telecommunications technician Clayton E. Poindexter, 35, and his brother-in-law, information technology consultant Mark Amoroso, 33, both from St. Louis, ran to the scene to help. Poindexter sprinted ahead while Amoroso called 911. Poindexter found Brenner upside down inside the cockpit, on fire, and calling out for help. He tried to dig dirt away from the partially broken canopy without success. He then kicked a hole in it but was unable to extract Brenner. Poindexter tried to lift a wing, but it was too heavy. When Amoroso arrived, Poindexter told him to lift the plane’s tail. Amoroso lifted it about 3 feet off the ground which pulled the canopy from the ground and gave Poindexter enough space to pull Brenner out of the wreck. Brenner’s clothing was on fire as he was dragged to safety, and Poindexter and Amoroso extinguished the flames by patting him down. When the flames reignited, they tore off his jeans. Brenner was taken by helicopter to a hospital after he had been badly burned and doctors later amputated his lower legs. Poindexter suffered minor burns and cuts on his arms and smoke inhalation. Amoroso suffered minor scrapes on his arms and smoke inhalation. Neither rescuer sought medical treatment.
After a 10-year-old boy fell into the fast-flowing Ogden River in Ogden, Utah, on May 19, 2024, his father, a man in his mid-40s, jumped in to grab the boy and the current swept them both downstream. Off-duty deputy sheriff James Peasnall, 46, from Tooele, Utah, was at a nearby playground with his family when he heard their screams. He sprinted along the riverbank and jumped headfirst into the water, on top of the father and his son. Peasnall wrapped his arms around the father and son as he landed and all three briefly submerged. He surfaced with both, wrapping his left arm around the father, while the father held the son. Peasnall swam with his free arm and approached a tree that stuck out of the water, toward the shore. Peasnall pushed the father onto the tree near the water’s edge, but the father let go of the boy, who was carried away by the current. Peasnall swam after the boy as the child disappeared underwater. He submerged several times until Peasnall located him and pulled him to shore about 150 feet downstream of the father. Peasnall heard more screams, climbed out of the water, ran back to where the father clung to the tree. He reentered the water and carried the father on his back up onto the riverbank. The boy and his father were cold but uninjured. Peasnall was cold, suffered bruises from striking rocks, and vomited water for about a day, but he declined medical attention.
During a Feb. 1 student band competition at a Pasadena, Texas, high school, an 83-year-old man armed with a pistol entered the building and shot into a group of people, wounding one man. The man fled to take cover, along with several bystanders, who fled to take cover, including teacher Juan F. Lopez, 42, from Hockley, Texas. Lopez attended the event with his wife, young son, and wife’s parents. When they realized there was an active shooter, Lopez’s wife, son, and mother-in-law scattered and hid. Lopez was guiding his father-in-law, who used a motorized scooter, toward steps to the auditorium when they fell to the hallway floor. As Lopez squatted and tried to help his father-in-law to his feet, the assailant jogged down the hallway with the gun toward their location. Just as the assailant was about to pass them, Lopez jumped up, grasped the assailant from behind, and tackled him to the floor. The assailant still held the gun in his right hand and Lopez gripped his hand before he eventually forced it to the floor as he leaned atop him. Lopez pinned the assailant down, who squirmed and moved onto his stomach, and asked Lopez to let him go. Lopez refused and shouted for others to call 911. About 40 seconds after Lopez intervened, other men alerted to the incident responded to pull the gun from the assailant’s hand and took over holding the man down. Police soon arrived and took the assailant into custody. He was charged with aggravated assault but died before the criminal case went to trial. The wounded man recovered after being taken to the hospital. Lopez suffered minor knee pain for about a week and recovered without medical treatment.
Following an early-morning Jan. 13 collision in Bagdad, Arizona, truck driver Edward Moorehead, 62, was pinned by the steering wheel inside his burning tractor trailer along a highway shoulder. Maintenance worker William Anthony Rubio, 37, of Franklin, Kentucky, was driving in the opposite direction when he saw the burning vehicle and stopped. Flames at least 6 feet high burned at the front of the engine area and outside the rear of the cab. Flames had breached the inside of the cab and burned at Moorehead’s feet and erupted from beneath the dashboard on the passenger side of the cab. Rubio crossed a dirt median and ran to the tractor trailer, where he attempted to open the driver’s door. After he was unsuccessful, Rubio then used a front tire as a step to elevate himself and held to a fender for support. He climbed onto the exposed engine, which brought him within reach of the cab. Rubio then punched his way through the cracked windshield. While steadying himself on the engine, he leaned into the cab to his waist and could see flames burning at the cab’s rear wall. Rubio placed his arms under Moorehead’s arms and maneuvered him out from under the steering wheel. Rubio lifted Moorehead onto the engine, where they then descended to the ground together. Moorehead was disoriented and stepped into the path of an oncoming tractor trailer. Rubio grasped him in time and pulled him back as he narrowly avoided the vehicle. Rubio and Moorehead crossed the lanes to safety at the median, where they waited inside Rubio’s vehicle for emergency personnel. About 15 seconds after they left the tractor trailer, an explosion occurred and flames intensified. Moorehead suffered abrasion to both knees, a laceration on his thigh, and a head injury. Rubio inhaled smoke but recovered without medical treatment.
Vincent Douglas Parr, deceased
On Aug. 20, 2023, in Albany, New Hampshire, Liliane Correia Parr, 37, and her daughters Amanda, 20, and Andressa Filhas, 17, were caught in the Swift River near rapids that descended over rocks into a deep swimming hole. Her husband and the girls’ stepfather, engineer Vincent Douglas Parr, 37, of Lawrence, Massachusetts, saw his family struggling in the water and entered to help them. The current swept him out as another man also entered the water to help. The man pulled Andressa out of the current and pushed her toward his wife on the riverbank. After the women made it out of the water, Parr remained in the river. The man who entered the river and his wife swam to Parr to pull him out but were unable to make progress against the current. It was then that Parr sank to the bottom. Another bystander later entered the river and helped remove Parr from the water. Despite CPR attempts, Parr could not be revived. He had drowned. Correia Parr and her daughters were cold but not injured.
James D.A. Badgley, deceased
While playing in the water 20 feet from a Lake Ontario beach in Picton, Ontario, on Aug. 4, 2024, 11-year-old Colton B.J. Valleau slipped on a rock and fell into the water. He was submerged by a wave and then was pulled farther from shore. His uncle, pipe laborer James D.A. Badgley, 35, of Picton, was on the nearby beach with other family members when he saw Colton struggling in the water. Colton’s mother was also on the beach and entered the water along with other members of their party. Despite knowing the lake could have rough conditions and that he was not a strong swimmer, Badgley entered the water and dived into the waves in an area where the lake bottom was rocky. He temporarily resurfaced where he stood and appeared disoriented before he submerged again. He did not resurface. Colton’s mother swam out to her son and managed to reach him. She put him on her back and towed him toward shore. They were pushed to the shore by the current and waves where they eventually reached shallow water where a friend aided them back to the beach. Colton was shaken but not injured. A search was initiated for Badgley, but the lake’s rough conditions and growing darkness impeded the efforts. His body resurfaced and was pushed to shore about six hours later. Badgley had drowned and sustained facial injuries which are believed to have been caused by striking rocks at the bottom of the lake.
During a Nov. 14, 2023, multi-vehicle accident on an Etna, Ohio, highway, a charter bus heading to a school band event with 52 students and three faculty members aboard was struck by a tractor trailer. Brynn Goedel, 16, was standing when the bus was struck and she was thrown about, causing serious injuries. A fire broke out at the tractor trailer and a second vehicle that then spread to the rear of the bus. While most of the bus passengers were able to evacuate, Brynn was rendered immobile and lying faceup in the aisle beneath some debris. A 37-year-old truck driver, Joshua Chieka, of Piedmont, Ohio, was driving nearby when he saw flames issuing from the bus and stopped. Learning that other students remained on the bus, he ran to enter through the open door of the bus. He ascended the stairs and then crouched down to move about 30 feet toward the rear of the bus amid floor-to-ceiling smoke. Chieka groped the air, trying to locate passengers, and then felt his hands brush Brynn. He grasped her while maintaining a crouched position and dragged her backward toward the front of the bus. With help from chaperones, Chieka moved Brynn to the shoulder of the highway. Emergency personnel eventually retrieved her and took her to a nearby hospital. Brynn suffered multiple pelvic fractures, rib fractures, a broken clavicle, a lacerated bladder, small burns to each side of her face, a second-degree burn on her left upper arm, and a concussion. After 43 days in the hospital and four surgeries, she recovered. Three other students on the bus died. Chieka inhaled smoke and suffered a small burn to his right forearm. He received medical treatment at a nearby hospital and recovered.
Michael E. Johnson and Frederick L. Palmer Jr.
At a municipal water authority site in Mount Pleasant, Pennsylvania, on Sept. 17, 2024, Pete Dunegan, 43, was working at replacing a valve inside an underground vault when a pressurized water line caused an interior pipe to dislodge from the vault’s wall. Water rushed inside and pushed the steel pipe and attached valves into the front of Dunegan’s left leg, almost completely severing it. Inside the vault with Dunegan installing bolts on the valve was water distribution system service worker, Michael E. Johnson, 54, from Ligonier, Pennsylvania. Johnson was knocked off his feet due to the speed of the water but quickly regained his composure. He saw that Dunegan was severely injured and semiconscious, as well as bleeding and unable to move. Johnson ascended the vault’s interior ladder and shouted to workers above that Dunegan was hurt and to call 911. Although Johnson shouted for others to shut off the flow of water at a valve about 1,200 feet away, water already in that pipe continued to fill the underground vault. After hearing Johnson and seeing the state of Dunegan, 60-year-old water distribution system service worker Frederick L. Palmer Jr. of New Alexandria, Pennsylvania, descended the vault’s interior ladder. He reached Dunegan as the murky water level rose inside. Both men tried to move Dunegan from the pipe he was sitting on, but they were unsuccessful. Johnson then shouted to other workers outside the vault for a lifting strap, which they threw to him. They removed Dunegan from the pipe and with the water at chest height were able to float Dunegan to the ladder. They shouted to a crane operator on-site to lower the crane, and they wrapped the strap around Dunegan’s chest and under his arms. A worker at ground level attached a loop of the lifting strap to the crane hook and Dunegan was lifted out of the vault where he was lowered to the ground. Johnson and Palmer exited to safety as the vault overflowed with water. Palmer used his belt as a tourniquet on Dunegan’s injured leg and Dunegan was then taken to a trauma center, where he underwent surgery to reattach his leg. Johnson tore a rotator cuff and suffered bruising to his back. Palmer was not injured.