Saratoga News

Photograph by Robert Scheer

Deputy Sheriff Sondra Serenka says helping others gives her the most satisfaction in her job.

Deputy sheriff is recognized as a hero by city commission

Deputy Sondra Sereka helped save 2-year-old from nearly drowning

By Sarah Lombardo

Tamela Kaesemeyer says there is a hero at the Santa Clara County Sheriff's Department Westside Substation: She's seen her in action and has a healthy little girl to prove it.

Deputy Sheriff Sondra Serenka is Kaesemeyer's hero, although Serenka will deny it. But deny as she might, her own superiors and the city of Saratoga have declared Serenka a hero. At the Aug.17 Public Safety Commission picnic, Councilwoman Ann Marie Burger presented Serenka with a certificate of recognition for her efforts in helping save near-drowning victim Tiffani Kaesemeyer, who will be 2 years old this month.

"[Public safety personnel] are the ones who keep us safe in our homes," Burger said. "The important thing about this was when [Serenka] heard it on the radio, she didn't hesitate. She didn't have to respond. ...It's a reflection of the quality and the dedication of the public safety people working for the city."

It was five months earlier on a March evening that Serenka, responding to a broadcast from county communications, arrived at Tiffani's great-grandmother's house and found the little girl on a table in the back yard, her father, Chad, struggling to breathe life back into her. Serenka performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation on Tiffani until paramedics arrived.

"I was so relieved, I can't even tell you," Kaesemeyer said of Serenka appearing on the scene. "She took over. It felt like nobody was coming. It took eight minutes for the fire department to get there, but it felt like eight years."

Serenka said she had not expected to arrive first on the scene when she radioed in and said she'd take the call. She said she drove by the fire department located on Saratoga Avenue, saw the trucks were gone and thought they had to be on their way. But the Saratoga Fire District engines had been called out on another emergency, and trucks from a department further from Tiffani's house were on their way--behind Serenka.

"When I got there, I thought, 'They're way ahead of me,' " Serenka said.

Instead, she was the only one there, and she saw Tiffani, blue and cold, on a table. Kaesemeyer said Tiffani was in the water about five minutes.

"We don't normally respond to these calls unless it requires our services directly," said Sgt. Chuck Griffin of the Westside Substation. He said Serenka responded voluntarily.

Griffin said the procedures Serenka performed on Tiffani possibly spared the girl permanent injury. "That couple of minutes may have been the reason the baby suffered no permanent damage," he said. "Time was extremely important."

But Serenka said she doesn't think she did anything very important; she was just doing what she could until help arrived.

"I was not going to stop [doing CPR] until someone told me to stop," Serenka said. "But I was a small part of this big scene."

Griffin said it was Serenka's quick action in the middle of a desperate situation that has to be admired. "She didn't even have to go, but she did go and took control of the situation and gave the baby life-saving CPR," he said. "She didn't hesitate; she just jumped right in there and did what she was trained to do. And for that, we're really proud of her."

Kaesemeyer said, "She saved my daughter's life--that's heroic. My daughter was purple when [Serenka] got there, and now she's a living, breathing little girl."

Serenka, quiet and seemingly shy, said it is helping people that gives her the most satisfaction in her job. An event in her family when she was 16 years old inspired Serenka to pursue law enforcement as a career. A deputy for more than 12 years, almost five of them in Saratoga, Serenka said she is "married to the job."

When paramedics arrived on the scene, Serenka said, they continued CPR on Tiffani into the ambulance and on the way to the hospital.

At 9 p.m., Serenka said she received a call from the hospital saying that Tiffani was still not breathing on her own and had not regained consciousness. "So we began the death report," Serenka said. "I had tears in my eyes."

But at 10 p.m., a call came in that Tiffani had rebounded; she was sitting up and breathing on her own. "I was very relieved, very happy," Serenka said. "There are many times the victims don't come back."

Bobbie Stoval, Tiffani's great-grandmother, said she doesn't even want to think about what might have happened if Serenka had not arrived and given Tiffani that few extra minutes of help.

"I thoroughly believe that if [Serenka] wasn't available at that time, we wouldn't have Tiffani today," Stoval said. "It was a miracle and it had to be that everyone was there and that someone up above was looking out for [Tiffani] that day."