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Saturday, April 26, 1997

12-year-old hailed for saving Finnish woman via computer

DENTON, Texas (AP) - Half a world away from Texas, a woman in Finland has received medical help that may have saved her life because of the persistence of 12-year-old playing on his computer.

At first, Sean Redden wasn't sure whether the "sob" and "pain" messages flashing across his screen were real or part of a game in the Internet chat room he had logged onto.

But Redden decided to take the messages seriously. With help from his mother, Denton County sheriff's dispatchers, international telephone operators and Finnish paramedics, 20-year-old business student Tarja Laitinen was rescued from a locked computer lab in Kerava, Finland.

The episode occurred April 14, but it wasn't until this week that Interpol verified Sean's good deed was real and not a hoax.

"Ms. Laitinen got the medical attention she badly needed that night and is now doing well," reads the international police agency teletype message routed Monday through to local sheriff's dispatchers. "It was real."

Sean said he was playing a character in a chat room called Glen Shadows Tavern, a cyber fantasy world where visitors play make-believe, when a new character entered the room and said, "Hello, help me."

While some Internet users took it to be just another fantasy, Sean typed, "What's the matter?"

The woman responded that she was an asthmatic college student in Finland who had stayed late in the computer lab, had gotten locked in and was having trouble breathing. She said she was getting worse by the minute and gave details including her name and address.

"It was too real to be a joke," Sean told The Dallas Morning News. He summoned his mother, Sharon Redden, who called 911.

Sheriff's dispatchers Debbie Strachan and Amy Schmidt had Mrs. Redden relay questions to her son to get more detail on the woman's condition and location.

A Texas phone operator was enlisted in the rescue effort and began calling Finnish operators.

Eventually, an ambulance crew was sent to the Finnish school, but it still took some time for rescuers to find Ms. Laitinen, with help from the messages she was sending to Sean and he was relaying.

"She started saying, 'It's getting worse,' " Sean said. "And our modem is, like, the slowest in the universe. I was pretty nervous."

Finally, she sent a message saying she could hear the paramedics in the hallway. Then the woman's sign-on disappeared.

For days, no one knew what had become of her or even whether the exchange was true. Finally, the word came from Interpol that Ms. Laitinen was all right.

"By keeping on the computer with her, doing what was necessary, (Sean) did save someone's life," said Denton County Sheriff Weldon Lucas. "Everyone at first thought it was a hoax, even him. It turned out great."

Sean's just glad everything worked out for the best.

"To be honest," Sean said between television interviews Wednesday, "I'm kind of embarrassed - not that I helped her but that all this happened." Send a Letter to the Editor about This Story | Start or Join A Discussion about This Story
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