The fire engineer who saved his co-worker after he was stabbed Oct. 8 by a patient in the back of the rescue unit has been named Jacksonville Firefighter of the Year.
Engineer Vincent Harper, a 10-year veteran, is the recipient of the 2019 Joseph F. Stichway Award. Fire Chief Keith Powers announced that Harper deserved the awards after enduring one of the "most terrifying and ultimately challenging scenarios ever witnessed," calling it a literal life-or-death struggle.
"The incontrovertible evidence of this horrific incident, however, established the bravery and courageous actions of Engineer Harper as the single-most decisive element preventing a fellow firefighter from perishing in an unpredictable random act of violence," the award said. "... Selfless and courageous actions that truly define heroism."
Harper was driving the rescue unit with Capt. Latorrence Norris when they responded to the 800 block of Franklin Street to help 38-year-old Tony Bernard Harris, who was complaining of abdominal pain, fire officials said. Harris was initially calm. But as Harper drove to the hospital, the patient got off the stretcher and lunged at Norris.
"In the ensuing struggle, the patient took the box cutter Norris had in his pocket and began to stab and cut Capt. Norris ... in the upper chest and abdominal area," Powers said.
Norris, with the department since 2006, suffered a punctured lung and other injuries as he wrestled with Harris, Powers said. As they got to the 2000 block of Boulevard Street en route to the emergency room, Harper heard the fight in back and stopped. He threw himself "in harm's way" to help, suffering a deep gash on his right thigh before police arrived to fully subdue their attacker.
A UF Health Jacksonville security guard got a radio call that firefighters were under attack near the hospital, putting the injured fire captain into her golf cart and taking him to the emergency room.
Harris, now classified as an habitual offender, faces a Tuesday pre-trial hearing as he awaits trial on two charges of attempted murder as well as resisting an officer without violence.
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