OAKLAND — An Oakland police officer and a sergeant were recognized by the department Friday for jumping into an Oakland Estuary channel early Sunday and rescuing a man floundering in the chilly waters.
Chief of Police Floyd Mitchell said the “heroic and outstanding” efforts of Officer Jessica Menezes and Sgt. Frank Negrete “is a story I love to tell about the hard work and dedication” of officers.
The rescue, which was captured on another officer’s body-worn camera, happened about 12:12 a.m. Sunday in the channel that runs from Lake Merritt south to the Estuary.
The rescued man remains hospitalized and police said they have not yet been able to identify him or determine how he got into the water and why.
Menezes and Negrete were the first to respond to a call of a clothed man in the water and saw the man offshore holding onto an extension cord being held by another person on shore.
The man had been in the water more than five minutes and was obviously having trouble holding onto the cord. The strong current and chilly waters were not helping him.
“If you are wearing clothes and are not a proficient swimmer it’s hard to get out” of that kind of situation, Negrete said at a news conference.
Negrete said because of the conditions the rescue was “challenging for sure” but added, “Our mission was to get him out of the water alive. Failure was not an option.”
Menezes had never been involved in a water rescue in her two years on the department. But she still knew “I had to do whatever I could to save him,” she said Friday.
Negrete, who joined the department in 2008, has done some water rescues before while working with the department’s marine unit and those experiences were extremely helpful, he said.
The pair was able to get the man, who had lost hold of the cord, to relax before securing him and start swimming to shore. Other officers who came to the scene helped get him on shore and to a hospital.
Both Menezes and Negrete said they would not hesitate to do another water rescue. “Absolutely!” Menezes said.
