Teenager who saved girl, 10, is haunted by ordeal at lake

Tyler Lennier is a hero, police say, but he lies awake at night with thoughts of murky water, screaming and two little girls who nearly drowned.

Lennier ran into Beaver Lake in Sammamish over the weekend to save a 10-year-old girl.

The Tacoma 17-year-old is haunted by the experience, and wonders if he did enough. The girl's younger sister also was underwater, but it took a few minutes before anyone knew.

"I'm trying not to think about it that hard ... but it's in my head 24-7," Lennier said.

"I was kind of upset," he added, "that I didn't find both of (the girls) at the same time."

The sisters were pulled from the water Saturday and rushed to the hospital. The 10-year-old was in satisfactory condition yesterday, while the 7-year-old was in critical condition, both at Children's Hospital & Regional Medical Center in Seattle, police said. Police are not releasing their names.

Investigators are looking into whether the girls' mother was adequately supervising them. King County Sheriff's officials will forward their report this week to state Child Protective Services and to the county prosecutor's office to consider possible criminal charges against the woman, sheriff's spokesman Kevin Fagerstrom said.

Saving lives isn't new for Lennier. He watched a young girl sink to the bottom of an apartment-complex pool in Federal Way a few years ago, and pulled her out in seconds.

"I guess I'm just at the right place at the right time," he said.

His latest ordeal began just minutes after he'd arrived at Beaver Lake Park for a barbecue dinner with his family. He said he watched his younger brothers swim from the shore, then noticed a head pop up out of the water.

He said he knew someone was in trouble and immediately took his shirt off and sprinted into the lake. The 10-year-old girl seemed dazed as he pulled her out, but she soon began to cough up water then said she was OK, Lennier said.

By this time, a small crowd formed, and the girls' mother was "scared out of her mind" for her children, Lennier said. The 10-year-old said something about her sister and how they had been playfully dunking each other.

Lennier returned to the lake with a sense of gloom. It had been at least five minutes since the older girl had been pulled out. He and others dived into the dark water and felt around with their hands, hoping the younger girl was somewhere on shore.

A friend of the girls' mother found the 7-year-old and pulled her out of the water. Bystanders performed CPR, and paramedics helped to restart her heart, Fagerstrom said. Police say Lennier's actions allowed both girls to be discovered. But it's little consolation to the teen.

"I know I'm not going to be 100 percent until I know for a fact that both girls are OK," he said.

The near-drownings were part of a string of water-related incidents during the Puget Sound area's recent heat wave, including at least four drownings.

Ashley Bach: 206-464-2567 or abach@seattletimes.com