Cable installer comes to aid of mail carrier

Friday, Aug. 23, 2002 | 10:41 a.m.

Oscar Gonzalez does not consider himself a hero.

He's just a 34-year-old cable television installer for Cox Communications who stopped to help another person in distress.

The U.S. Postal Service, however, says the person in distress was one of its mail carriers, who was being grabbed by a resident of an apartment complex while she was delivering mail at about 4 p.m. on Aug. 1.

Gonzalez defused the situation by calmly talking to the attacker and persuaded him to let go of the mail carrier. His efforts have earned him the Postal Service's Local Heroes Award.

"I'm still trying to take it all in that they are honoring me -- I was just trying to help out," Gonzalez said Thursday as he worked his route in northwest Las Vegas. "But, come to think of it, there were people standing around just watching what was going on."

Brian Johnson, manager of the postal station where the attacked carrier works, said when he read the report about the incident, he was so impressed by Gonzalez's brave actions that he wrote a letter to the local postmaster, nominating the soft-spoken cable guy for the hero award.

"He faced a dangerous situation, resolved it and no one was injured," Johnson said. "That is what being a hero is all about."

The incident occurred as the carrier, who the postal service has declined to identify, delivered mail to a Washington Avenue apartment complex that was not part of her regular route. She was helping another postal employee who was running behind schedule and had not yet arrived.

Johnson said a man approached her and demanded his welfare check. She told him it was against policy to stop in the middle of filling the boxes and look for a specific piece of mail. She told the man he would have to wait for her to finish and then he would have to open his locked box to get his mail.

Johnson said that the man continued to yell at the carrier and soon was joined by his wife, who also yelled at the postal employee. In accordance with safety policy, she closed the boxes and left without completing the job. She was pursued to her truck by the man, his wife and their children, Johnson said.

Gonzalez said he drove his cable van into the area and saw the postal employee hanging out of her truck and screaming for help as a man held her from behind yelling for her to give him his check.

"One of the things I learned from dealing with the public is to remain calm," said Gonzalez, who stands 5-foot-11 and weighs 205 pounds, and says he does not consider himself physically intimidating.

"I simply told him in a calm tone, 'Sir, you have to back off. The lady is upset. Let her do her job and you'll get your check.' "

Gonzalez's bosses are beaming over his handling of the matter and the recognition he is receiving from the postal service.

"Cox is extremely proud of Oscar," said spokeswoman Stephanie Stallworth. "Our employees receive safety training for such situations. Oscar is a very calm, level-headed worker -- an overall good person with a heart of gold."

After the attacker calmed down, Gonzalez stayed with the shaken postal worker until police and postal inspectors arrived.

Johnson said the postal worker felt compassion for the desperate family and declined to press charges against the father. She finished delivering the mail.

"I later saw the man go to his mailbox and get his check," Gonzalez said. "All he had to do was wait to avoid that whole incident."

At a special morning ceremony today at Cox Communications on South Martin Luther King Boulevard, Gonzalez was to receive a plaque featuring the "hero stamp," a commendation for his heroic deed and $200.