Valor Awards
Bronze Medal of Valor
Corporal Keith Hermann Franklin Township Local 154
Working overtime
It’ s not very often that police officers have to bring their work home. But for Franklin Township Local 154 Corporal Keith Hermann, this was the case and the site of his heroics.
On the night of March 19, Hermann was awoken by a strange noise coming from the first floor of his house. He immediately woke his wife Nadine, and told her to call 9-1-1. He crept slowly down the stairs and told the potential intruder that he was an off-duty officer who was armed and he was coming down the stairs. The situation went south quickly, and he was forced to fire his weapon to protect himself, Nadine and their two-year-old son when the intruder advanced on Hermann. Within minutes, on-duty officers arrived on the scene, took the suspect into custody and provided the suspect and Hermann with medical care.
The suspect was responsible for committing several car burglaries within the area, but for this incident he pleaded guilty to burglary in the third degree.
Hermann has served on the force for 23 years and has served in the traffic safety unit for 18 of those years.
Hermann gives credit to his training and range officers for preparing him to handle a situation of this severity.“ They taught me that if you have a bad feeling about something, to go with it; never second guess yourself,” he said.
Asked to describe how he felt about being honored, he characterized it in one word: Disbelief.
Hermann’ s humble demeanor came to light when he expressed his anxiety at the thought of having to give a speech after accepting the award. For him, he was just doing what he thought any other officer would have done.
In fact, he requested that the on-duty officers who responded to the scene be honored instead of him.“ I asked for the officers who responded to the scene to be honored and felt that they deserved to be honored and they jumped in when I didn’ t know if I had any more left in the tank,” he said.
However, the real hero in this scenario for Hermann is his wife Nadine. Hermann claimed that she was key to the situation because she communicated with 9-1-1 and the on-duty officers the most,“ She’ s modest but the information was given by her not me,” said Hermann.
“ I’ m proud of him, and he did what he had to do,” Nadine explained.“ The biggest thing was he walked back up the stairs that night, so I don’ t care,” she said, looking at Hermann with tears in her eyes.
It’ s not every day that an officer has to bring his work home with him. But on that night, Corporal Keith Hermann followed his instincts to protect his family in a dangerous situation, and luckily, following those instincts paid off.“ My job came home with me that night,” he said,“ and that’ s not something that I thought I would ever have to do.” d
56 NEW JERSEY COPS ■ DECEMBER 2017