Sanchez was trapped inside with a broken leg and cracked ribs, but he managed to find a void in the rubble and crawl out to safety.
Then he got back to work, broken bones and all.
Sanchez was honored Tuesday for going back inside the factory to help those who were injured and free other people still trapped inside, “quite possibly saving human lives,” Graves County Sheriff Jon Hayden said in a Facebook post Tuesday night.
“Mr. Sanchez after freeing himself, with a broken leg and cracked ribs, unselfishly went and found tools and other items and returned and re-entered the rubble,” Hayden wrote.
On Tuesday, Hayden presented Sanchez with a Sheriff’s Meritorious Award.
Hayden said a volunteer firefighter gave Sanchez and several other people who had been injured in the collapse at Mayfield Consumer Products a ride to the emergency room.
Hours later, after a cast had been put on his leg, Sanchez was released from the hospital.
The sheriff said Sanchez then approached a state trooper at the hospital “and told him that he was an inmate and needed to turn himself in.”
“The trooper told him that with everything going on, that he was not in a position to help him at that moment, and to do the right thing,” Hayden wrote.
Learning that the jail had been destroyed by the tornado, Sanchez caught a shuttle bus to a shelter, where “he was put in contact with jail staff” who returned him to custody, the sheriff said.
The inmates at the candle factory were working there through an agreement between the jail and the factory.
Robert Daniel, the deputy overseeing Sanchez and six other inmates working there that night, died in the collapse. All of the inmates survived.
Another inmate walked away from the hospital after being injured in the collapse and later turned himself in at the Calloway County Jail, Kentucky State Police said.
Hayden said that in the aftermath of the tornado, he “began hearing about an inmate who worked feverishly” to help others at the candle factory, and he asked the jail staff to look into the veracity of the stories. Hayden said witnesses confirmed that it was Sanchez.
Last week, he said Sanchez went before McCracken Circuit Judge Tim Kaltenbach, who was made aware of Sanchez’s actions at the candle factory and who determined that he had just 14 days left to serve.
Hayden wrote that Sanchez “chose” to finish out the sentence rather than receive shock probation.
While Hayden did not specify what charges Sanchez was being held on, the Graves County Jail website lists an inmate named Marco Sanchez as being held for first-degree bail jumping.
“Mr. Sanchez had a lot of decisions to make that night. He could have made the decision to only save himself, but he didn’t. His actions likely resulted in other lives being saved,” Hayden wrote. “The series of decisions he made over the next several hours were the right decisions and we applaud you for that sir.”
Hayden said that when Sanchez is released March 1, “he will be looking for a job and a place to live.”
“We hope someone will take a chance on him and give him an opportunity to start a new life,” the sheriff wrote. “He is a hard worker, as he has been assisting county government in moving offices since the tornado, and he is a very humble man. We wish him the best and applaud him for his sense of humanity.”
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