Woman honored as hero for spotting starvation victim

A Carson City woman who made the phone call that ended five years of imprisonment for a brother and sister was honored Tuesday in Las Vegas for heroism.

Sarah Koerner was among six others throughout Nevada honored during the Fifth Annual Heroes Luncheon at the Palace Station Hotel & Casino.

Koerner said she was returning to work from lunch on Jan. 19 when she spotted the tiny girl, barely tall enough to reach the handles, pushing a shopping cart on East Second Street. The child didn't look well and seemed too young to be out on her own, Koerner said.

As other cars stopped to let the girl cross the street, or drove around her as she walked in the middle of the road, Koerner grabbed her cell phone and called police. She was the only one to call.

"I didn't hesitate. I just felt something was wrong. I was just concerned," Koerner said.

Her call led deputies to the girl, who told them she was 16 years old and had just escaped from a bathroom where she and her younger brother had allegedly been held captive for years. She weighed only 41 pounds when officers found her.

Deputies located her 31-pound, 11-year-old brother at the apartment.

Koerner has said in the past she didn't do anything heroic.

"It was the girl (who was the hero)," Koerner said weeks after the children were liberated. "She was the spunky little thing that decided she was going to get out that day."

Koerner was honored Tuesday as the 2006 Northern Nevada Outstanding Citizen by the Nevada chapter of the Community Associations Institute.

The national association began the awards ceremonies following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, as a way to honor professional and private heroes across the U.S.

• Contact reporter F.T. Norton at ftnorton@nevadaappeal.com or 881-1213.