Medal Recipient Search
Catherine J. Stepps, nominated by St. Louis Fire Department
2018 Class
Awarded on: 10/07/2019
Public Safety Civilian Partnership Award
On March 30, 2018, the St. Louis Fire Department responded to a report of a residential structure fire. Smoke was coming from a one-story brick building, which firefighters quickly entered. They conducted a primary search and extinguished a very smoky cooking fire. They found the elderly resident safe outside the home. As firefighters investigated, they discovered that a neighbor, Catherine Stepps, had smelled smoke from inside her neighboring home. She ran toward the residence, jumped a fence, and entered the home. The fire was coming from the kitchen in the rear of the smoky home, so Ms. Stepps covered her face with her shirt to fight the thick smoke. With no firefighting training or protective equipment and without consideration of her own safety, she searched the house and found her elderly neighbor asleep on a couch. Ms. Stepps awakened him and led him out of the house through the smoke. He would tell his rescuer, “Thank you, baby. You’re a life saver.” The responding St. Louis firefighters are convinced that without Ms. Stepps’ fast, heroic response, the man would have been seriously injured or killed.
Tyler Preston, Gabriel Gowen, and Jordan Lambay, nominated by Kirksville Police Department
2018 Class
Awarded on: 10/07/2019
Public Safety Civilian Partnership Award
On the night of June 29, 2018, Kirksville Police officers were dispatched to a domestic assault involving an axe. When officers arrived, they found a woman face down in the street surrounded by blood. She had life-threatening injuries and was airlifted to a hospital for treatment. The officers noticed a civilian holding down another man who was covered in blood. Jordan Lambay, a Truman State University student, was restraining the man who had been wielding the axe. Lambay and fellow Truman State students Gabriel Gowen and Tyler Preston had all helped end the attack and get the victim medical attention. The three students had been in Gowen’s apartment when they heard yelling and screams outside. They saw a man brandishing an axe and the victim trying to defend herself. There were also children screaming for help. While Preston called 911, Gowen and Lambay left the apartment to help the victim. Lambay quickly grabbed the axe and tripped the attacker. Gowen joined the struggle, pulled the axe away, and got it out of the immediate area. Lambay then held the attacker on the ground until police arrived. Kirksville Police believe had Preston, Gowen, and Lambay not responded, the attack would have continued and the victim would have died from her injuries.
Marlin V. Matchett, nominated by Taney County Ambulance District
2018 Class
Awarded on: 10/07/2019
Public Safety Civilian Partnership Award
On July 19, 2018, Mr. Matchett was on the Showboat Branson Belle working as part of the first aid team when a severe storm with high winds and heavy waves sank a tourist duck boat near the showboat. Mr. Matchett, a trained paramedic with decades of EMS experience, quickly called for additional help. He then began rescuing victims by pulling them from the water onto the showboat. Using his extensive EMS experience, he helped triage the injured and also coordinated and directed other civilians who were working to assist the terrified victims. When a young victim was in cardiac arrest, Mr. Matchett performed CPR until ambulance personnel arrived and took over the desperate and ultimately unsuccessful effort. During a catastrophic event, Mr. Matchett heroically worked to help save multiple lives.
David Watkins, Jr., Mississippi County Sheriff’s Office
2017 Class
Awarded on: 11/13/2018
Medal of Valor
On March 10, 2017, a team from the Mississippi County Sheriff’s Office was serving a search warrant to a convicted felon suspected of narcotics trafficking at a second-story apartment in Wyatt, Mo. Lieutenant Watkins had the lead as the team announced their presence and breached the apartment door. Lieutenant Watkins entered the front door and immediately took fire from the suspect. Other members of the entry team were forced to take cover on the ground outside. Shot in the left leg, and trapped in the apartment with the gunman, Lieutenant Watkins crawled into a nearby room. Unable to stand, he sat against a wall. Outside, his team called for Lieutenant Watkins. Watkins did not answer so as not to reveal his position to the gunman. The gunman, still armed with an AR-15, walked to the front door, where officers were taking cover, and looked outside. He then turned and saw Lieutenant Watkins and began raising his weapon. Lieutenant Watkins fired his weapon striking the gunman in the upper torso, ending the threat to him and the other officers. Watkins then staggered to his feet and held the gunman at gunpoint until his team members took control of the scene. While under fire and while wounded, Lieutenant Watkins demonstrated incredible courage while trapped inside an apartment with a gunman.
Leon Whitener III, St. Louis Fire Department
2017 Class
Awarded on: 11/13/2018
Medal of Valor
On April 22, 2017, a call went out for a structure fire with a person trapped in St. Louis’s Botanical Heights neighborhood. The closest fire station was responding to an earlier reported fire, so there would be a delay in the first company’s arrival. Captain Whitener, who was off duty, immediately responded. He found thick gray smoke pouring out of the two-story residential building. Residents outside the building told him a wheelchair-bound tenant was trapped on the second floor. Captain Whitener charged into the building and up the stairs without any protective equipment. He was followed by a tenant from another unit in the building, Raymond Rayford. The smoke was filling the hallway. Smoke billowed into the room where they found the woman in her wheelchair. She futilely covered her face to try to block out the smoke. Captain Whitener knew time was short because the smoke was building pressure in the room. They pushed the wheelchair to the apartment doorway but furniture blocked the exit. Mr. Rayford threw the furniture out of the apartment to clear a path. Whitener and Rayford then hoisted the wheelchair over the stair railing and down the stair, careful to protect the woman. Once outside, they heard glass shattering. The fire had grown tremendously and was now venting itself out of the room from which they had just rescued the woman. Captain Whitener’s swift and decisive action while off-duty resulted in the rescue of an elderly disabled woman who could not have survived on her own.
Logan Benjamin, Vandalia Police Department
2017 Class
Awarded on: 11/13/2018
Medal of Valor
On June 19, 2017, Corporal Benjamin responded to a residence to check on the welfare of a man who had been texting an ex-girlfriend that he was considering suicide. When he knocked on the front door, Corporal Benjamin heard a loud thud and gasping coming from inside. Corporal Benjamin immediately made entry and found a man hanging from a support beam from a belt that was around his neck. Corporal Benjamin grabbed the man around the legs and waist and lifted him to prevent certain strangulation. But the man repeatedly hit Benjamin in the head. Struggling to prop the man up, Benjamin’s portable radio microphone was knocked off, preventing him from calling for assistance. Despite the man continuing to fight violently, Benjamin managed to call for assistance and used his tactical knife to cut the belt the man was hanging from. As both men fell to the ground, the suicidal man went for Benjamin’s knife. Benjamin drew his service pistol and commanded the man to stop trying to hurt himself and Benjamin. The suicidal man complied and was transported to a hospital for a mental health evaluation. This man remains alive and well to this day because of Corporal Benjamin’s quick thinking and unwavering determination.
Michelle L. Vogel, Missouri Department of Corrections
2017 Class
Awarded on: 11/13/2018
Medal of Valor
On the night of Aug. 5, 2017, Corrections Officer Vogel was off duty when a window air conditioner caught fire in an apartment in Vogel’s apartment complex. Officer Vogel rushed into the burning building. The fire had spread throughout most of the first floor of the apartment. Inside, through thick smoke, and intense heat and flames, Officer Vogel searched to find anyone who might be trapped. As a result of her search, she found a four-year-old girl, who she quickly got out of the building to safety. Officer Vogel also made sure everyone else was out of the burning building. Outside, the girl’s mother, who was pregnant, was having trouble breathing. Officer Vogel attended to the mother until EMS arrived on the scene. Officer Vogel later took children’s clothing to the family to assist them in the aftermath of the fire. While off duty, Officer Vogel acted without hesitation and reached a young child trapped in a burning residence long before firefighters could have reached the trapped child.
Ryan Windham, Missouri State Highway Patrol Troop E
2017 Class
Awarded on: 11/13/2018
Public Safety Medal of Merit
On March 6, 2017, Trooper Windham was on routine patrol on southbound Interstate 57 in Mississippi County when he observed a motor vehicle that was missing a front license plate. Trooper Windham followed the vehicle and activated his lights and siren. The driver refused to stop. A pursuit ensued and ended when the driver slid of a roadway. As Trooper Windham approached the stopped car, the front seat passenger fled on foot. The back seat passenger exited and began firing a handgun at Trooper Windham. Trooper Windham returned fire and moved toward the rear of his patrol car for cover. The suspect fired at least six rounds, three of which struck Windham’s vehicle, one hitting the vehicle’s spotlight, directly in front of Trooper Windham. A manhunt later took place and all three occupants were taken into custody without incident. All three were convicted felons and members of a violent gang with outstanding warrants for their arrests. Trooper Windham’s attention to detail and bravery under fire resulted in the apprehension of these violent offenders.
Christopher Papineau, Columbia Police Department
2017 Class
Awarded on: 11/13/2018
Public Safety Medal of Merit
On the evening of May 13, 2017, a gunman, high on Methamphetamine, was firing a shotgun indiscriminately from the back of a residence. The gunman was in a tree and had a box of shotgun shells. Upon arriving, two officers were struck by shotgun pellets. The officers tried to negotiate with the gunman and set up a perimeter, but he quickly escaped with the gun and ammunition. The Columbia Police Department SWAT team was activated. As the first group of SWAT officers arrived in the area, the gunman was seen climbing onto the roof of an events center several blocks from the original scene. Inside, a graduation party was taking place. Many residents were also outdoors at a neighboring multi-story apartment complex. The SWAT team pulled within 60 yards of the gunman. He refused to comply with demands and stated he wanted to kill or seriously wound law enforcement officers and that he would not surrender. The gunman was in a prone shooting position when a pedestrian walked into his field of fire. Officer Papineau fired a single shot to prevent the gunman from harming the pedestrian. The gunman fell from the roof and was pronounced dead. Facing a gunman who had fired at civilians and officers, stated his intention to harm or kill others, and refused to negotiate, Officer Papineau acted to protect innocent civilians.
Frank Mininni, Normandy Police Department, Chief of Police
2017 Class
Awarded on: 11/13/2018
Director's Leadership Medal
Colonel Mininni became Normandy Police chief in 2009, after serving 22 years with the department and steadily rising through the ranks. His two decades of experience made him aware of the gulf that existed between law enforcement and many residents in the north St. Louis County community. Determined to get his officers out of their police “bubble,” a month after becoming chief, Mininni introduced the Normandy Area Policing Initiative. It is a community engagement program designed to create real relationships between police and residents. The program implanted officers from each of the department’s divisions into specific areas of patrol. As people interacted with police, citizen satisfaction rose in resident surveys conducted by the department. To expand contacts with youth, Colonel Mininni implemented a lunch program that encouraged officers to eat lunch at local schools and engage with students. In 2015, Normandy Police and a partner nonprofit were awarded an $800,000 federal grant to put school resource officers back into the Normandy Schools Collaborative. Through these and other community engagement efforts, Colonel Mininni has worked to break down barriers and develop greater trust between citizens and law enforcement, and increase public safety in his community.