Officer's chase, fiery rescue `part of job'

0 Comments | Register-Guard (Eugene, OR), August, 2003

Byline: Tim Christie The Register-Guard

Cottage Grove police officer Britton Munoz said he was just doing his job, which in this case means braving a shower of sparks and flames from a downed power pole to pull a teen-age woman out of a wrecked, stolen vehicle.

Moments earlier, the woman allegedly had been doing her best to elude Munoz in a high-speed chase south of Cottage Grove.

"This is basically what I got into this line of work to do," said Munoz, a 14-year veteran of the department. "People may think we're heroes. This is basically part of the job and this is what we do for a living."

The incident began about 5:30 p.m. Thursday when police received a report that two people were putting gas into a suspicious, possibly stolen vehicle...