This Tacony teen risked himself to save a stranger’s life

On a Tacony street, a small crowd gathered around the white pickup truck, where a woman inside was in medical distress.

The Thursday evening scene was chaotic and no one was sure what to do. The woman appeared to be having a seizure, and her foot was on the brake, but the truck was still in drive. The doors were locked; the woman was unresponsive.

Enter Jaheim Warner, a 17-year-old with no connection to the woman, but with a brave streak and a strong sense of duty.

Warner said he happened upon the emergency after baseball practice at Tacony Academy Charter High School, where he’s a junior. Some friends had decided to run to McDonald’s for food, but Warner said he’d skip it and walk home.

Warner saw people crowded around the truck, banging on the windows. Someone was on the phone with 911, he said.

“She was having a really bad seizure,” Warner said. “I asked if there was anything I could do.”

He felt nervous — not for himself, Warner said, but for the stranger. What if she couldn’t breathe?

But Warner was resolute: The right thing isn’t always the easy thing.

So he started banging, too, but even the force of multiple people’s smacks on the window wasn’t working. Warner said he then had an idea — what if he smashed the small back window, then climbed through?

He rummaged around in a nearby pile of trash. The woman’s medical situation seemed dire. He wondered if she was having difficulty breathing. He knew he was risking his own safety with the truck not in park, but he didn’t feel like he had a moment to waste.

“I found a metal flimsy pole, I hopped in the bed of the truck and I broke the rear window,” said Warner. “I cleared the glass away, I squeezed into the truck, and I put the car in park.”

Warner spoke to the woman in a calm voice, he said. That seemed important, even if didn’t appear she could hear him.

“I told the lady it was going to be OK, and I wasn’t going to leave her,” he said.

Warner, who wants to join the Philadelphia Fire Explorers, a public safety training program for young people, stayed until emergency services personnel arrived.

He accepted kudos from the people who had gathered around the woman, and then he walked home. He didn’t tell his family about what had happened — he wasn’t looking for any attention, he said.

Later that night, a Facebook post caught his sister’s attention. Someone who had apparently been at the scene wrote a post describing his heroic actions in the group Philaqueens:

“If your son’s name is Jaheim & he goes to Tacony Academy Charter High School, & he plays on the baseball team, I want you to know you raised an absolute angel,” the post read. “He has the brightest future ahead of him & whoever raised him deserves so much kudos.”

That people are calling him a hero is astonishing, said Warner. He didn’t set out to do that. He just set out to help.

“It’s making me proud,” he said. “I didn’t know I could do something like this.”

As for Warner’s mom, Jaimee Warner, she was delighted, but not exactly surprised at her son’s kindness and bravery.

“He’s that kind of person,” his mother said. “That’s who Jaheim is.”

Warner said he doesn’t know what happened to the woman he helped.

“I just hope she’s OK,” he said.