'She's my hero': Florida librarian saves 4th-grader from choking on candy

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Moments of fear led to a heroic rescue at a library in Jacksonville, Florida.

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Cheyla Scantling told ActionNewsJax, "It's not something I thought about. It was something that I had to do."

She didn't have a moment to spare when 10-year-old Matthew George came to her barely breathing.

The fourth-grader said, "One of the librarians gave me a lollipop and when I was playing on a computer, and I swallowed it whole and it got stuck in my throat."

That's when Scantling came to the rescue.

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"He was like, ‘I can't breathe, Miss Cheyla,' so that's when I grabbed him, did the Heimlich, and the candy came up right there," she said.

It's a situation Scantling never imagined she'd be in, but with the proper training, she was able to be Matthew's hero.

"He's like family, really, so I definitely was going to be there for him," she said. "I definitely was going to help him and do what I had to do."

And Matthew calls her just that. "She's my hero," he said.

Cox Media Group