Kansas City, Missouri, police officer helps save life of infant struggling to breathe

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — An officer with the Kansas City, Missouri, Police Department helped save an infant struggling to breathe on Thursday.

"It was about a one month old baby that wasn't breathing," said KCPD Ofc. Richard DuChaine, who saved the infant.

The call came after a normal morning in Tajane Allen's house with her family tending to her infant daughter Ka'Miyah.

"We woke her up to change her diaper and you know to feed her like we normally do," Allen said.

Allen said her motherly instincts kicked in and she noticed something was off with her daughter.

"She was just there she was a statue,"Allen said." She just went lifeless."

Allen said those few moments of realization were scary, immediately calling 911.

"Like she stopped breathing and her heart stopped and she was gone," Allen said.

DuChaine and his partner Charles Owen responded to reports of a 1-month-old girl who wasn't breathing, and arrived to the scene before emergency medical services, according to KCPD.

"Once we got there, the family was telling us that she was a preme, come to find out she was only a month and six days old," DuChaine said.

The pair ran inside the home, and the father of the baby handed her to DuChaine.

DuChaine performed infant chest compressions on the girl, and she began breathing again, a tweet from KCPD says.

" I did compressions for about 10 to 15 seconds, then I flipped her over and I started doing some back thrusts to make sure there was no obstruction in her lungs," DuChaine said.

DuChaine then turned the girl on her side, while Owen attempted to locate obstructions.

"After serval back thrusts, I could start seeing a little bit of light come to the baby and then shortly there after we got her laid on her side and we started seeing stuff come out of her mouth," DuChaine said. "And we started seeing the baby finally moving, making noises, you could hear the air coming out of her lungs."

Allen said she was amazed seeing DuChaine save her daughters life, and she is forever grateful.

"I'll do anything for that man, I'm grateful he saved my daughter's life," Allen said.

Officer DuChaine says he felt a connection to the family, and wanted them to know he understood their pain.

"I had a preme child myself, so I absolutely know what that feeling is as a parent, he said. "What this comes with, because having a preme, they're susceptible to everything you could think of."

Currently, baby Ka'Miyah is recovering at Children's Mercy, where she was diagnosed with RSV, which caused her to stop breathing Thursday.

Allen says she is happy that her daughter is alive and recovering well, but still can't get the thought out of her mind that she almost lost her daughter.

"I feel a lot of relief, but at the same time I don't think I can just be relieved from it because she wasn't here for a second," Allen said. 

DuChaine said the most rewarding part for him was knowing Ka'Miyah was going to be okay.

Allen and her family are now forever grateful for DuChaine's efforts in saving her daughters life.

"The officer showed me that it's some type of good in the world because he saved my daughter," Allen said.

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