While some mothers received candy, flowers and cards for Mother’s Day, Beatrice Cepele got a one-of-a-kind gift: Her son returned home—alive and unharmed—after pulling a man from a fiery car crash.
“What better gift is there than knowing your son did a good deed?” Beatrice Cepele said.
Her son, North Central College student Raymond Cepele, was returning home with long-time friend Rimas Barsketis 1 a.m. Sunday, May 10, when the pair spotted a crash scene along southbound I-355. They arrived just in time, coaxing—and dragging, when he resisted—the driver away from the vehicle before it was consumed by flames.
“That’s not a normal, everyday occurrence,” said 19-year-old Cepele. “I think we did pretty well, looking back at it.”
When Cepele and Barsketis arrived at the scene, the driver was sitting quietly in his front seat as flames spread. The pair began “screaming at the top of (their) lungs,” coaxing the driver away from his Chrysler Sebring. As they neared the edge of the road, Cepele and Barsketis signaling oncoming traffic, the man turned and began walking back to the burning car. The heat intensified; the tires popped.
“I took him by the collar and just said, ‘no way that’s gonna happen,’” said Cepele, who pulled the man across the street, away from the smoking wreck.
Both Cepele and Barsketis left the scene unharmed, and the driver—who, according to one witness, was speeding before he crashed into the I-355 medium—did not require medical treatment. He was later charged with DUI.
“Regular people save lives every day—it’s not just police officers and firefighters,” said Marc Molina, North Central College director of campus safety. “An incident like this is a testament to someone’s character. I’m proud of Ray; I’m proud of our students. From what I’ve heard, we have some heroes here.”
One of the keys to Cepele’s heroics that night, according to Molina, was his calm, quick thinking; immediately after seeing the man in the front seat, he called police. Starting a dialogue with police can save lives, said Molina—especially when there’s a fire, a reportedly intoxicated driver and a car that threatens to explode.
While Cepele showed his character amid a raging fire and honking cars, his mother said that he may have developed those skills in a quieter place: the golf course.
“Ray’s a go-getter,” she said. “He’s not afraid…and he just has this spark, this desire to help and to not let others down. He knows how to work on a team, too.”
Long before he pulled a man from a fiery car crash, a 3-year-old Cepele picked up a golf club. He played mini-golf with his father, forming a bond that stands 16 years later. In Aug. 2014, the father-son duo traveled to Detroit, MI, competing at a tournament for golfers of Lithuanian descent. As a varsity member of the North Central College Men’s Golf Team, Cepele has continued to foster his competitive nature, team mentality and cool head, placing among the best golfers in the area at the 2015 College Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin (CCIW) Championships. Head Coach Mike Murray said that Cepele is a “people-person,” someone “willing to get involved and help.” He’s shown bravery, compassion, resolve—and, said Murray, that isn’t limited to sports.
“There’s a huge carry-over from athletics to real-life situations. That’s one of the reasons we participate in sports: to practice for life,” Murray said.
As Director of Campus Safety, Molina wants other students to practice for life, too. While he doesn’t recommend putting one’s health in danger, the former police officer said that every witness should be an “active bystander,” preventing harm through direct or indirect intervention.
“Oftentimes, we have the opportunity to intervene—and that can mean calling 9-1-1, distracting someone from violence or intervening directly,” Molina said. “It’s the premise behind bystander intervention training.”
North Central College students are following Molina’s advice. While not every student has rescued someone from a burning car, many are engaging in bystander training through the Green Dot Program. As part of the nationally-recognized Greendot, etc., the College’s program teaches students to perform “green dots”—acts that prevent violence. The program divides interventions into three categories: direct, distract and delegate. Bystanders can prevent harm directly, as Cepele did, or by distracting or delegating the intervention to another party. During Green Dot programs, students can discuss violence and bystanders—acting out scenarios and watching clips of Jon Quinones’ “Primetime: What Would You Do?” They get free snacks, too.
“You don’t have to be a superhero; you don’t have to do everything,” said Carin Silkaitis, North Central College Assistant Professor of Theatre and Green Dot instructor. “I just want people to feel a responsibility for each other.”
Cepele, however, did act like a superhero; at least, that’s how Beatrice felt when her son arrived home early Mother’s Day morning.
“Seeing your kid in front of you like that…the ‘mama moment’ kicked in. I was proud,” she said.
