Bourbeau Recalls Experience in Saving Millwood Boy's Life

It was supposed to be a relatively routine evening for New Castle police officer Ramond Bourbeau, when on Sept. 29 he responded to a car vs. deer report along Route 100 in Millwood. But urgency set in when he was informed from headquarters that a boy down the road was choking.

The boy, 3-year-old Kethan Labana, had swallowed a piece of orange for a snack before dinner. His family was tried to help, but his condition worsened, leading them to call 911.

On his way over, Bourbeau quickly thought about what needed to do next to save Kethan.

He said, “so my main focus was getting there as quickly and safely as possible, but also in the back of my mind, I was saying to myself ‘What is it I’m going to do when I get there? What am I going to be up against?”

Bourbeau arrived to see frantic parents and Kethan, “very, very limp,” turning purple along his mouth. Quickly, he gave the boy a series of body blows, then put Kethan's back towards his chest and did a thrust. The chunks of orange suddenly came out and hit the floor, and Kethan was “starting to get a little bit of a color back," Bourbeau said.

Once Bourbeau gotten the situation under control, he gave Kethan some oxygen, then a fellow officer, patrolman Mendoza, and members of the Chappaqua Volunteer Ambulance Corps (CVAC) came then brought him to Northern Westchester Hospital in Mount Kisco for observation.

“Once I saw that he started breathing, there was certainly a large, large feeling of relief," Bourbeau said. "But I still had a lot of adrenaline going through me.”

Since that time, Boureau, a 13-year officer with more than 6 years in New Castle, has gotten praise from the community. Kethan's father, Harry Labana, gave a detailed account of his work in a writeup for New Castle NOW. The boy's mother, Alicia, praised him at an Oct. 11 town board meeting (see video here on NCCMC).

“I can’t tell you how relieved we were," she was recorded as saying in a tape of the meeting. "Words cannot describe how my husband and I felt that evening.”

At that meeting, Bourbeau was honored for his efforts. He has also gotten the praise of his colleagues.

"Mr. [CVAC member Gerry] Kearns stated that officer Bourbeau had certainly save the boys life due to his quick thinking and effective emergency medical treatment," wrote Sgt. Chiappone in a police report about the matter.

The situation was not the first in Bourbeau's career. About a decade ago, when he was a police officer in Hyde Park, NY, Bourbeau said that he also helped a choking infant.