By leaving, he was jeopardizing a spot on the football team. The man he saved is grateful he did.
By NORA KOCH
Published January 29, 2004
[Times photos: Douglas R. Clifford]
Justin Gregorich went into the water to help save a man who drove into the retention pond in the background.
Clearwater Fire and Rescue Lt. Tom Allegretti emerges from a retention pond after diving to retrieve a Lincoln Town Car, which had careened off SR 580. Click here for larger photo
CLEARWATER - At 5 feet 3 and 130 pounds, Justin Gregorich couldn't lift as much weight as other aspiring football players, who gave him a hard time about it.
Justin, 14, was so upset he left practice at Countryside High School early Wednesday afternoon and began walking home, dejected and worried.
The coach will be mad, he thought. Why did I leave?
At that moment, a gold Lincoln Town Car veered off the road in front of him, flattened a sign and rocketed into a retention pond.
Justin began running. "It happened so fast. I turned my head and bam! - the car was in the water."
As it sank, Justin dove into the 62-degree water. Two other passersby also jumped in. One opened the car's door. Justin grabbed the driver's right arm. Another man took the left arm, and together they swam 50 feet to the bank.
The driver, Raymond J. Kane, 82, of Orlando, was in good condition Wednesday night at Mease Countryside Hospital in Safety Harbor.
"It's amazing - there are snakes and there are alligators and it's cold, and its amazing to see people, with no regard for their own safety, all three of them just jumped in right after that guy," said Mike Eash, a paramedic Safety Harbor Fire Rescue.
Justin's actions didn't surprise his mother, Alice Gregorich, of Safety Harbor. "He would do this for anybody," she said.
She said her son has a "kind soul."
"The weird thing was, I didn't really want to leave football," said Justin, who has Tourette's syndrome and obsessive-compulsive disorder. "I just left because I got this urge."
Justin said Kane's real saviors were Michael McBrayer and Shawn Brady, two Dunedin men who also stopped and jumped into the pond. Neither could be reached Wednesday.
"They're more heroical than me," he said.
Kane declined comment through a hospital spokesman, but he told a Sheriff's Office deputy at the scene that all three rescuers were his "heroes."
Justin, a freshman, had decided to try out for Countryside's junior varsity football team.
To prepare for this fall's season, potential players spend the spring and early summer lifting weights to get in shape. After school Wednesday, Justin went to the team's conditioning practice.
He can bench press 65 pounds, and he squats 125 - amounts that brought ribbing from others in the weightroom. Justin got frustrated enough to leave early.
Usually on Wednesdays, Justin calls his mom for a ride home. But he decided to walk the mile and half, brooding about his decision.
"I'm thinking, man, aw, I should have stayed at football, the coach is going to be mad at me, why did I leave?" he recalled. "And - WHAM!"
A few hundred yards in front of him, the car careened off SR 580 just west of McMullen-Booth Road, near the Clearwater-Safety Harbor border.
The car barreled through a 51/2-foot tall chain-link fence, traveled about 100 feet on the grass toward the pond and hit a drainage culvert. The car plunged into the pond and began to sink, grill first.
Justin turned around, yelling for someone to call 911.
"Then I was like, I gotta save that guy," said Justin.
He ran to the water, put down his backpack and took off his white sneakers and khaki pants. He climbed over the damaged part of the fence and saw McBrayer and Brady doing the same. The three dove into the pond and swam to Kane's car.
As the front half of the car went under water, Kane scrambled to the back seat. One of the men opened a back door, then he and Justin pulled Kane to safety.
"He told me, "Thank you very much,"' Justin said.
After Justin and his mother left for home, a team of divers from Clearwater Fire Rescue, along with firefighters, sheriff's deputies and a tow truck driver pulled the car from the water.
On Wednesday night, after he changed into dry clothes, Justin was hoping that his decision to leave early wouldn't hurt his chances of making the team.
"I really love football, and I hope the coaches understand."
Assistant coach Jared Davis said he is glad Justin helped.
"It sounds like something he would do," Davis said. "He seems like he has a good heart."
- Times researcher Caryn Baird contributed to this report. Nora Koch can be reached at nkoch@sptimes.com or call 727445-4165.
Click here for larger photo