Governor's Medal 2023 Class, awarded on Sept. 12, 2024

Nicole Ellzey and Scharihen Ward, Missouri Department of Corrections

On the afternoon of November 16, 2023, in the Jefferson City Correctional Center’s Housing Unit 3, an officer instructed an offender to return to his cell from an area considered out of bounds. Officer Ward was requested to assist in attempting to gain compliance. Once Officer Ward arrived at the scene, the offender struck her in the face with a closed fist several times. The offender then pulled a 7-inch metal prison-made weapon and began slashing and stabbing the other officer in the head, face and arm. Sergeant Ellzey observed the struggle from outside the wing, gained access and helped the officers take the offender to the floor. Sergeant Ellzey then got the weapon away from the offender. Officer Ward was then able to fully restrain the offender. Officer Ward suffered a puncture wound and bruising and swelling to her face. Sergeant Ellzey and Officer Ward, who like all corrections officers serve without firearms, risked their own lives to control a violent offender who possessed a lethal prison-made weapon, preventing additional lethal threats to staff and other offenders. Scharihen Ward has been promoted to sergeant. Sadly, Sergeant Ellzey died unexpectedly of a brain aneurysm on June 9, 2024. She was 46.

Robert Fincher, Dalton Koch, James Mora, Wade McElfresh and Tom Thompson, O’Fallon Police Department

On the afternoon of October 10, 2023, a 13-year-old boy experiencing a mental health crisis ran from his middle school to the Sonderen Street overpass over Interstate 70 with the intention of taking his own life by jumping from the overpass. Responding units arrived in less than three minutes and found the boy straddling the concrete barrier over I-70. Officers Mora, Koch and Fincher made contact with the boy and worked to establish a rapport with him, but he only wanted to speak with Officer Mora. Meanwhile, Sergeant Thompson supervised the scene on the overpass and staged firefighters and ambulance personnel to be ready to render first aid. Sergeant McElfresh closed the interstate and then directed that several tractor trailers be positioned under the overpass to break the juvenile’s fall, if necessary. Because the boy was swinging both his legs over the bridge ledge with nothing but the interstate beneath him, Officer Mora repeatedly inched closer. Mora closed the distance between them by displaying pictures of his dog on his cellphone, but the boy was still in crisis. Once he was close enough and the boy became distracted, Officer Mora risked his own life by lunging at the boy and then began pulling him back from the ledge. Officers Koch and Fincher helped secure the juvenile who was quite large for his age. Other officers assisted Officer Mora in getting the boy back to a safe position on the bridge. During a pressure-filled, life-or-death incident over loud, swift moving interstate traffic with a distraught boy’s life hanging in the balance, Sergeants McElfresh and Thompson and Officers Fincher, Koch and Mora demonstrated compassion, creative thinking, teamwork and unflinching determination to save a life.