12-Year-Old With Down Syndrome Saves Sister From Drowning

The Richardson family has had a pool for 16 years. In all that time, mom Tomarra Richardson swears they’ve never had a safety scare. “But in a split minute all that changed,” the Mundy Township, Michigan, mother of three tells Yahoo Parenting, describing how her youngest child sneaked into the pool and began drowning on July 23.

Three-year-old Jac’Lynn “attempted to get in her swim tube in the pool and went through to the bottom,“ Tomarra told ABC 12. And the preschooler — who’d followed her 12-year-old sister Carin back out to the pool after their family had finished playing — couldn’t swim.

STORY: Man Saves Drowning Girl ‘Nobody Else Even Noticed’

“Without panic or fear,” Tomarra told the TV station, “[Carin] grabbed her goggles, got in the water, and pulled her sister out of the pool and into the house.” Tomarra immediately helped Jac’Lynn cough up some water as Carin’s elder sister, Krystal Bishop, called 911. Carin “was our hero — she saved her sister’s life.”

STORY: 2 Olympic Swimmers Who Drowned as Kids Share Their Scary Stories

Jac’Lynn Richardson in her family’s pool. (Photo: Tomarra Richardson)

By Jennifer O’Neill

Read more from Yahoo Parenting:

Mom’s Car Saved By Strangers While She’s in ER

12-Year-Old Uses Make-A-Wish to Feed His Community

The Emotional Moment a Special-Needs Orphan Meets Her New Family

Mom Saves 2-Year-Old Before Tragic Fall