Los Angeles officials honored a California crossing guard for saving an 8-year-old girl from an attempted abduction.
Alexandria Avenue Elementary School crossing guard Adrian Young says she sprung into action after she heard the child shout for help, reports CNN.
“The little girl just started screaming, she was like, ‘Please, don’t let her take me, I don’t know her, she’s not my mom,'” recalls Young, KABC reports.
Young then held onto the child while fighting off the would-be kidnapper.
“I just told her to grab onto me as tight as she could, and I held onto her and the lady just began to attack me, so I just thought about attacking her to make sure she can’t take this little girl,” said Young.
Thankfully, Young was successful.
Police later caught up with the suspect, 50-year-old Maria Ramirez, and charged her with one count of felony kidnapping. She was being held in lieu of $100,000 bail.
Many are praising Young and are calling her a heroine.
“Sometimes superheroes come in small packages,” Los Angeles City Council Member Mitch O’Farrell said while honoring Young, who is less than 5 feet tall, at a public event. “And because of her diligence, training and awareness and just because she cares so much about children, she prevented what could have been a kidnapping of a child.”
“I think the inner city is overlooked for heroism,” said Colleen Riley, reports KNBC. “I think people think there’s a lot of crime here. I think the angels throughout carry us, and [Young is] definitely an angel.”
But Young doesn’t see herself as any of these things.
“I kind of went into mother mode at the time, and as a crossing guard, because I couldn’t see myself letting this little girl be taken,” Young, who is a mother herself, explained.
“I’m very grateful for all the accolades, but I just did what I felt was right,” she add. “I felt that if it was my child, I would want someone to protect her. I couldn’t see myself let that little girl be taken.”
The child’s mother was especially grateful.
“If it [wasn’t] for her, I wouldn’t know where my daughter would be right now,” said mother Sharon Arellano, reports Hollywood Patch.
Arellano also expressed concern the school was not doing enough to keep children safe.
“To me, I didn’t feel that they did what they needed to do to keep my child safe, and apparently they seemed like they didn’t care because, thankfully, someone helped her,” she added.