Saratoga News

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Good Samaritans rally to aid Saratoga woman who fainted

By Michele Tjin

Longtime Saratoga resident Judy Stokes was having anything but a good day. She was sick and running a fever, and she fainted and hit her head outside of a grocery store. However, her story has a happy ending.

In late August, Stokes was stricken with pneumonia and was dehydrated. She went to Gene's Market on Quito Road to pick up some water and medicine. She got help loading her bags into her car, but then she fainted. She fell on her head and was bleeding.

In her moment of confusion and fear, though, some good Samaritans came along to help her, Stokes said. Three customers and two Gene's Market employees, David Rapson and Valerie Mullen, stayed with her and comforted her until the ambulance arrived 15 minutes later.

"They'd rub my back, and they'd hug me," Stokes said. "They were so wonderful."

She wants to thank her attendants who were there at the right time, and she especially gives credit to Rapson and Mullen, whom she sees regularly when she shops at Gene's but doesn't know personally. Stokes said Rapson even volunteered to drive her car home, park it in her driveway and put the keys in a safe location.

"Sure enough, he did," she said. "I would have been lost without them. That would have been an awful long wait if they weren't there."

God sent the right people to her, she said. Stokes spent three days at Kaiser Permanente Medical Center in Santa Clara and is taking it easy these days. However, Stokes, a grandmother and a 35-year-resident of Saratoga, won't stop singing the praises of those who have a caring spirit.

"I want to give honor to young people when they do nice things," she said. "I think this shows that we live in a good community."