KALAMAZOO (WKZO-AM/FM) — Kalamazoo Public Safety had to rescue a man from a burning apartment in the 1500 block of Portage Street, in a building broken up into four units.
First responders arrived on the scene at 7:30 a.m. Sunday and rushed in and discovered a kitchen fire and an unresponsive 34-year-old man lying on a couch.
PSO Amir Khillah carried the man out of the building. The other PSOs on the scene were able to quickly douse the kitchen fire, but the building will be uninhabitable until repairs are made to the electrical system.
The cause is being investigated.
PSOs say the smoke detectors in that apartment were not working, but the smoke detectors in the next apartment were working, and when they went off the neighbor called 911, possibly saving a life and preventing the fire from spreading.
The same public safety officer who rushed into that burning apartment yesterday morning to save a life is getting credit for possibly saving himself from a felon with a handgun yesterday afternoon.
Khillah made a traffic stop on a car on Stockbridge at about 2:30 pm Sunday. As he walked up to the driver’s window, he could smell marijuana. When he got to the window he spotted a handgun on the front seat of the vehicle. When the driver began to reach for the gun he was able to stop him with some loud verbal commands and get the suspect out of the car.
When officers tried to search the 33-year-old Kalamazoo resident he resisted and stuffed drugs into his mouth and swallowed.
They took the man to the hospital for treatment and then booked him into the Kalamazoo County Jail for gun and drug felonies, resisting and obstructing, not having a license and violating probation.
