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Hennepin Co. Honors Man Who Saved Girl From Drowning

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) – A 9-year-old girl is alive and well all thanks to the quick thinking of a stranger.

De'Asia Johnson fell to the bottom of a pool at the Bloomington Ramada last month. Guy Brown heard Johnson's mother screaming for help, jumped in and saved her.

Now, the community is honoring him for his actions.

De'Asia's mother remembers the horrifying moment her 9-year-old daughter slipped out of her hands in a pool last month. Neither of them could swim.

"[I was] screaming, asking for help. Asking anybody around the pool for help," DeNeya Johnson, De'Asia's mother, said.

Brown was at the pool visiting friends.

"Out of all the yelling and screaming by the kids and everybody else, it was a different kind of screaming," Brown said.

Brown and another man jumped into the pool without hesitating. He swam nine feet to the bottom and pulled De'Asia out.

"He gave her CPR," DeNeya said.

De'Asia was rushed to the hospital. Brown visited her in the ICU as she recovered.

But he saw her up and well for the first time Wednesday when she came to see him be recognized with a Merit Award from the Hennepin County Sheriff's Office.

"I gave him a hug and I like being here today," De'Asia said.

De'Asia 's mother said she'll never forget Brown, a stranger no more.

"He's a hero. He saved my daughter's life," DeNeya said.

When asked, Brown said he was just doing what anyone would do.

"I think I did something that everybody else would have done, or I wish. I have my own son and I would hope if that happened to him I would think someone would do the same," Brown said.

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