Police officer saves boy’s life 20 years ago, man is now an officer himself

MALDEN, MO (KFVS) - Jacob Redden doesn't remember the day he almost died, but Sergeant Scott Wilson said it's one day he will never forget.

"When I got there, there was this mother and father and they had a small child and he was real blue and wasn't breathing," Wilson said, "He didn't have a heartbeat."

Redden said he owes Wilson his life.

"Luckily Sergeant Wilson showed up and did CPR and saved my life," Redden said.

His parents had been taking him to the hospital after a seizure when little Jacob stopped breathing.

"You could tell that it wasn't going to be long and he wasn't going to recover from it," Wilson said.

However, when the two-year-old started crying, Wilson said the feeling of relief was indescribable. He said he didn't want Redden's parents to experience something he has dealt with himself…the loss of a child.

"Trying to hold back the tears. I had lost my own son a few years before that, 8 or 9 years before that. [He was] about the same age. And it was really scary," Wilson said.

Twenty years later, Redden said he's doing what he loves as an officer for the Campbell Police Department.

"After he saved my life I always figured if I can save another person's life then I've completed my goal," Redden said. "The only thing that pops in my mind when I think about that day is lucky that he was there, that he arrived so fast."

Wilson has watched Redden become a man and said he's proud of the career he's chosen. He made that clear when he spoke at Redden's graduation from the police academy.

"I actually told the story of Jacob and I then at the end I got to give him his diploma," Wilson said.

Redden and Wilson have kept in touch all these years and don't plan to stop any time soon.


"Luckily Sergeant Wilson showed up and did CPR and saved my life,” Redden said.