Girl, 9, rescuer drown in Plymouth

Updated: August 16, 2011 - 12:03 AM

A third person pulled them from a pool at a Plymouth apartment complex. Efforts to revive them were not successful.

hide

Samson Williams and Tonita Garnett stood at the fence by the pool where a 9-year-old girl and a 26-year-old man died just hours after the man jumped into a pool at a Plymouth apartment complex to try to save the girl from drowning. Both were friends of the 26-year old man.

Photo: Carlos Gonzalez, Star Tribune

Camera Star Tribune photo galleries

Camera view larger

resize text
print
buy reprints

Tweet
share

email
Email share

your name

your email

recipients email

+ add a comment add a comment

A 9-year-old girl and a 26-year-old man died Monday night after the man jumped into a pool at a Plymouth apartment complex to try to save the girl from drowning.

Lisa Kiava, a spokeswoman for the Hennepin County Sheriff's Office, said the 9-year-old girl and her 14-year-old sister were visiting relatives at the Lancaster Village Apartments.

Friends gathered Monday night at the first-floor apartment where the 26-year-old victim whom friends identified only as "Moses" lived with his fiancée. The 9-year-old who died and the 14-year-old were the fiancée's sisters, their friends said.

The friends said the girls were born in the United States but were visiting from Liberia. The girls were to go back next month.

Kiava said the 9-year-old went to the deep end of the pool and began struggling. The man jumped in to try to save her but he also began struggling.

A man who heard the 14-year-old screaming ran to the pool and pulled both out of the water.

Both were unconscious when they were pulled from the pool. CPR was started and they were taken to North Memorial Medical Center in Robbinsdale. Kiava said the call came in to the Sheriff's Office at 4:25 p.m.

Lancaster Village resident Ruth Tita said a man and woman who live in the complex heard the girl's screams and ran to the pool to see if they could help. Tita said the man pulled both victims out of the water, then he and his fiancée began chest compressions. Tita said she tried to console the 14-year-old, who continued to scream for her sister.

"I gave her all the comfort I could," Tita said.

PAT PHEIFER AND MARY LYNN SMITH