Marine Lifts Pickup Truck Off Boy Pinned Under Wheel

PALM DESERT — A Marine hoisted the front end of a pickup truck off a boy who was pinned under the wheel of the runaway vehicle, officials said.

Sgt. Jeff Campbell, with the Twentynine Palms Marine Corps Air/Ground Combat Center, freed 5-year-old Caleb Parsons from under the truck’s front left tire Monday, Riverside County sheriff’s deputies said. Caleb, who suffered a broken right leg and bruises, was treated at Eisenhower Medical Center in Rancho Mirage and released, a nursing supervisor said Tuesday.

The accident occurred when the boy’s mother parked her Toyota pickup. She stepped out, leaving Caleb and a second son, age 1, inside the truck. One of the boys moved the gear shift into neutral and the truck began rolling backward, deputies said.

Caleb jumped from the truck, holding onto the driver’s door in an apparent effort to stop the vehicle. When the truck stopped, after striking a curb and a street sign, the boy was tossed under it.