Crash witness saves bloodied victim
Crash witness saves bloodied victim
By TAMARA CHERRY, QMI Agency
TORONTO - A tow truck driver is being credited with saving the life of a young man as he bled out next to a Vaughan road.
Brad Gewarges was riding in the back of his buddy's car, heading west on Hwy. 7, when it was hit by an eastbound vehicle that was turning south onto Marycroft Ave., just east of Pine Valley Dr. at 5 p.m. last Friday.
The 24-year-old man was ejected from the car, sending his head into a curb before he landed on a grassy area.
"I've never seen an accident like that in my life," said tow truck driver Rob Mileto who was pumping gas across the street when he heard two bangs he said "sounded like a bomb hit Woodbridge."
"It looked like a horror show. His blood was gushing out of his head like a water hose," Mileto said.
Mileto, who is running for Vaughan council in Ward 3, grabbed whatever cloth and bandage he could find in his first-aid kit and wrapped up Gewarges' head until he looked "like a mummy," he said.
"(Paramedics) said if it wasn't for him that my brother would have either died from choking on his own blood or he would have bled to death or he would have been paralyzed just laying there," Simona Gewarges said, speaking for her sibling who couldn't answer questions because of his head injury.
According to Mileto, this sort of behaviour is nothing new.
"This is the 13th life I've saved from 1993 until now," he said. "I feel good. I do it every day, all the time ... that's my job."
In 1996, Mileto was profiled in the Sun for helping firefighters lift an overturned vehicle to free an elderly driver.
His campaign website reads: "A HERO for Ward 3."
Two days in hospital and 19 staples-to-the-head later, Gewarges was released and, aside from memory problems, is expected to recover, his sister said.
His cousin who was riding in the front passenger seat suffered a concussion, while the friend who was driving lost part of his ear, she said.
York Regional Police allege the crash was the friend's fault, charging the 28-year-old with careless driving, failing to properly wear a seat belt and failing to surrender his insurance card, Const. Rebecca Boyd said.
And while Gewarges may not remember the moments before he was ejected, police pieced this much together: He wasn't wearing his seat belt.
tamara.cherry@sunmedia.ca