A day after he was seriously injured while escorting a funeral procession, a Slidell motorcycle officer was recovering at University Medical Center, much to the relief of a grieving father whose son the officer was trying to get safely to his final resting place.
Officer Jason Seals was on Gause Boulevard escorting the hearse that carried body of PFC Jason Decker, a 25-year-old soldier who died last week at Fort Hood from a medical condition.
A car suddenly drove into Seals’ path. The collision sent the officer soaring off of his bike.
"He was thrown over 50 feet from his motorcycle and for him to still be with us right now is nothing short of a miracle," said Detective Daniel Seuzeneau, Slidell Police Department spokesman. "God was with him. There's no question about it."
Adam Galloway, a trained paramedic and Decker’s father, saw Seal’s motorcycle down in the road. He hopped out of his car and rushed to the officer’s side to administer aide.
"I could tell he had labored breathing, possible head injury,” Galloway recalled Wednesday. “Eventually he responded after somebody called his name a few times and he actually gripped my ex-wife's hand.”
The coincidence that Seal’s first name -- Jason -- was the same as Galloway’s son’s brought him to tears as he tries to assist the officer.
“I asked the deputy what was his name and he said his name is Jason,” Galloway said. “I broke down because that was my son's name that we were in the funeral for.”
But he put his emotions aside. "I was trained to do that, and I did. I tried to do what I could for him. I just wanted to make sure he was alright. I would do that for anybody."
An ambulance arrived a short time later and rushed Seals to UMC's trauma center in New Orleans.
Slidell police are optimism about Seals’ long term prognosis.
"We're limited in what we can say as far as his medical condition, but he's stable and he's improving every hour," Seuzeneau said.
State Police are investigating the accident. No citations have been issued so far.