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Employees rewarded for valor

January 22, 2001

Two Breslin Student Events Center workers were recognized Sunday for their efforts in saving a woman’s life at a November concert.

Ron Hanson, a Breslin Center ticket taker, and Jason Lilly, who worked as a student usher, were given the MSU Department of Police and Public Safety’s Life Saving Award and made honorary members of the department. The award has only been given out about four times in the last 10 years.

Upon noticing a woman not breathing at a Nov. 9 Carman concert, the two men remained calm while notifying paramedics, administering CPR and helping medical workers get the woman to a hospital, said Bruce Benson, director of the Department of Police and Public Safety.

The woman had suffered full cardiac arrest.

“There’s no question this woman would have died if it wasn’t for them,” Benson told a crowd of Breslin Center employees gathered to recognize the men before the men’s basketball game against Ohio State.

Hanson, a Clinical Center radiology worker, and Lilly, a former student now attending a mechanical school in Florida, downplayed their role in saving the woman’s life.

“We just followed the paramedics’ lead,” said Hanson, who has worked at Breslin Center since it opened in 1989.

Hanson and his wife both work at the arena as supervisors.

Lilly, who was an usher in the section next to the woman, credited CPR certification courses for helping him know what to do. Ushers do not receive such training at Breslin Center, although many MSU police personnel do receive first aid training.

“When it was done I kind of sat back and said, ‘God, what just happened?’” Lilly said. “When it was going on I really didn’t think anything.

“You’ve just got to stay calm and take one thing at a time.”

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