By Danny Valentine
St. Petersburg Times
PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. — Devonte Dawson is only 4, but he could tell his great-grandmother’s eye didn’t look normal. Then he noticed her hand was shaking and she couldn’t talk.
Doctors would later say 67-year-old Janie Mae Leshore was having a seizure, but at 10:10 a.m. Thursday, Devonte knew only that there was a problem and no one was around to help.
So he did something kids his age might not even know about: He called 911.
“Her hand is shaking,” Devonte told a Pinellas County dispatcher that morning.
“Her hand is shaking?” asked the dispatcher.
“Yeah.”
“Do you know what’s wrong with her?” the dispatcher asked.
“Uh-uhh,” he said.
The dispatcher asked for the address. He didn’t know it.
“Does she need an ambulance?”
“Yeah,” he said, a few seconds later adding, “she can’t talk.”
The dispatcher said paramedics were on their way. Devonte never left her side through the five-minute phone call.
Leshore and police believe that Devonte’s quick thinking saved her life. “Oh, I’m so proud of him,” Leshore said.
She was hospitalized for three days and is expected to make a full recovery. On Tuesday, she was feeling a little weak, but otherwise all right, said Geraldine Caldwell, Leshore’s sister.
Caldwell and Leshore’s niece, Erma Smith, were in the house at 2906 Third Ave S earlier that morning but left for less than an hour to run errands. They said Leshore was in her usual good health. When they got back, Leshore was being loaded into the back of an ambulance.
“Oh boy, you should have seen us,” said Caldwell. “I was so nervous. It just took a toll on me.”
But Devonte was there.
Devonte’s mother, Aisha Beckwith, 20, taught her son to call 911 about a year ago for just such an incident.
“I think that was very smart of him,” Caldwell said. “A lot of kids don’t even know how to dial 911.”
She said Devonte has always been a smart kid who catches onto things quickly. Leshore said her great-grandson was observant and good with computers.
He’s also a budding rapper. His nickname: CD.
“He loves to try to rap all the time,” Caldwell said with a laugh.
Copyright 2010 Times Publishing Company