Bystanders save Midland police officer, help arrest a suspect
MIDLAND, Tx. June 14 2020 A man is in custody after he attacked a Midland police officer and tried to take his gun.
CBS7 met with one of the bystanders who stepped in and saved that officer’s life.
Alex Salinas said his family was driving past this lot where the fight broke out.
As soon as he saw the officer was in trouble, he knew what he had to do.
Without hesitation, Salinas got out of the car and went straight into the fight.
He said the attacker was trying to gouge out the officer’s eye and put a hand on the holstered gun.
“I went for his arm, his hands, to try to take it away from him,” Alex said. “He had it gripped so I thought just do what you can. That’s all I was thinking, do what I can.”
It was enough.
While another woman tackled that man at the legs, Alex pulled that hand away from the gun and got the other hand away off the officer’s eye.
“I squeezed it and when I squeezed it, he let go of the officer’s eye,” Alex said. “He yelled ‘Agh! My eye!’ Like, he had him pretty bad.”
Pretty soon the combined effort overpowered that attacker and the officer was able to cuff him.
Alex could have easily been hurt been badly hurt if things went the other way, but his wife Erica said that’s just who he is.
“He’s always, always ready to help somebody and he will literally take the shirt off his back to help anybody,” Erica said. “It doesn’t matter who it is. If you need help and he sees it, and he feels it in his heart that he needs to help you, he’s going to help you.”
That bravery earned him this commemorative coin brought to his family by the midland police department.
It reads: Am I doing the right thing at the right time, the right way and for the right reason?
I think it’s safe to say he did.
Alex said if he and the other bystander hadn’t stepped in, that officer and others could very well have been killed.
“For the Midland Police Department to come and give my family this,” Alex said looking at the coin. “It’s something I did. It’s something good I did. I’m proud of it.”
The Salinas family said they plan to display that coin somewhere in their house as a reminder to always help other people no matter what.
KOSA
