The Medal of Valor is the Department’s highest award, earned by employees distinguishing themselves by conspicuous bravery or heroism above and beyond the normal demands of correctional service.
The employee shall display great courage in the face of immediate life-threatening peril and with full knowledge of the risk involved.
The act should show professional judgment and not jeopardize operations or the lives of others.
2024 Medal of Valor recipients
Thomas Coyle, Senior Laboratory Assistant
Mule Creek State Prison
Thomas Coyle risked his own life to help save at least two other lives on his drive home from work in August 2023.
Coyle was stopped at a traffic light in Sacramento County behind a CHP officer when he saw a garbage truck slam into a Chevrolet Silverado, causing the pickup truck to fly through the air, landing in the middle of Grant Line Road.
It immediately burst into flames. Two other vehicles involved struck a power pole, causing it to lean and knocking down high-voltage power lines.
The CHP officer in front of Coyle initially did not see the accident so Coyle hit his horn to alert the officer, who immediately pulled forward and blocked the intersection.
Coyle pulled safely onto the side of the highway and began to run to the vehicles and see who needed assistance. There were a couple drivers who had minor injuries. However, the drivers of the Chevy truck and the garbage truck were still in harm’s way.
The Chevy was fully engulfed in flames, causing ammunition inside the vehicle to ignite. The driver was outside of the vehicle, badly injured and disoriented. Coyle pulled him off the ground and moved him away from the flames to safety behind the CHP vehicle while waiting for paramedics to arrive.
Coyle then looked over and saw flames surrounding the garbage truck with the driver still inside. He pointed this out to the CHP officer and the two of them pulled the driver from the vehicle and moved him to safety.
The fire personnel who had arrived shortly before determined that the scene was unsafe and yelled, “Everybody get out of here. That pole is going to come down!”
Coyle once again risked his life, grabbing the Chevy driver behind the CHP car and transferring him to a Rancho Cordova police car, which was out of danger from the leaning power pole.
Charles Davis, Sergeant
Pelican Bay State Prison
Sgt. Charles Davis risked his own life to enter a burning house to save a stranger. It turned out that the life he saved was the nephew of another sergeant at Pelican Bay State Prison.
On a Friday afternoon in August 2023, Davis was driving home in Crescent City after working a double shift when he noticed a house on fire. He pulled over and pounded on the front door. Dogs were barking inside, and a neighbor said multiple people lived in the home.
Davis entered the house and searched the rooms for occupants. As he was searching, he was bit multiple times by the dogs in the house. In one bedroom, he found a young man sleeping. Davis woke the young man and asked if anybody else was home. The young man said he was alone, and Davis carried him out of the house.
Davis was also able to rescue three of the dogs from the house, which by then was engulfed in flames. The fire was so large it required multiple departments to respond to stop it from spreading to the surrounding area.
The burned house happened to belong to the sister of another Pelican Bay State Prison sergeant. Her son has a severe mental handicap requiring medication that causes him to sleep very heavily.
Being home alone and having taken his medication, he would not have woken up in time to escape.
Had Davis not entered the burning house, the young man would have perished in the blaze.
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Read more stories of bravery on Inside CDCR’s Above the Call series.