Man Injured By Car Crashing Into Restaurant Called A Hero By His Family
ELK GROVE (CBS13) - It's been two weeks since a car crashed through an Elk Grove restaurant and into a man who jumped in front of his wife and young son as the car barreled right for them.
That father continues to recover after his leg was badly injured in the accident.
"I could hear my wife screaming, 'My husband! My husband!' and I told my wife, 'Honey, it's OK," Arthur Tellez said from his hospital bed on Tuesday.
Tellez never imagined a celebration at his son's favorite restaurant could turn so wrong so quickly.
"I walked out the door and I seen the car coming.
The family was leaving the Hometown Buffet in Elk Grove in the direct path of a Toyota Camry speeding toward them.
Arthur had to make a split-second reaction.
"When I seen the car coming, I pushed my wife and my son
"He just acted so fast to push me and my son out of the way and took the hit for us," his wife, Lora, said.
But the terror was far from over. Arthur said the elderly driver, who apparently hit the gas instead of the brakes, was still accelerating.
"That's when my leg had just really ripped apart and I felt the blood coming out," he said.
Pinned to the front door, this father's only thoughts were for his family as onlookers rushed over.
"I asked him, I said, 'Sir, can you please take off my belt to put a tourniquet on my leg?' because I didn't want to bleed to death," he said. "I love my family dearly and I don't want to leave my family."
Six surgeries later and there is still no guarantee he'll ever walk on his own again. But Arthur's focus remains the same.
"This, what I'm going through right now, my legs, is nothing. I have my son here and I have my wife here and I thank God for that," he said.
"He truly is a hero," his wife said.
But to Arthur, he just did what any dad would do.
"I thank God for my son because every day I know I got my son over there still," he said.
Arthur faces a seventh surgery on his leg and at least another month of recovery after that before he can leave the hospital.
