WEARE, N.H. (WHDH) - For officer Paul Lewis, there has never been any other option than to become a police officer.
Lewis was able to fulfill his dreams and was working on the Weare, New Hampshire for a few months before he was sidelined when he was shot in the line of duty earlier in the month.
Now, on the road to recovery, Lewis spoke out about his harrowing ordeal.
“Yeah, this is a bump but, I am going to be getting back out there and I am going to try to kind of keep going,” he said.
Lewis was shot in the arm Aug. 1, when he and his partner were responding to a domestic violence incident in the middle of the night.
The officers were able to help a woman safely escape from the house before the suspect opened fire on police.
“We do this type of job knowing that we might have to make the ultimate sacrifice,” Weare Police Chief Christopher Moore said. “Luckily, he didn’t have to. But, he was able to extract someone from the residence without that person getting injured, and he took the hit. So, absolutely, he’s a hero.”
Following the incident, Lewis was rushed to the hospital where he underwent emergency surgery.
“I am doing pretty good right now. I’m myself, I feel myself,” Lewis said. “I am very limited as far as my arm goes.”
The suspect, armed with a shotgun, was later found dead inside the house. The medical examiner determined that he took his own life.
Officer Lewis who grew up in Whitman and graduated from Bridgewater State University said he now focused on making a full recovery and getting back to work.
“My dream was to be a police officer so that of course is what I want to get to,” Lewis said. “But, that will be some time. It might be six months. It might be longer before I am on the streets and serving the town that I want to serve.”
Lewis has one more surgery coming up to try and repair some of the nerve damage done to his arm. In the meantime, he said he is laser-focused on getting back behind the wheel of a cruiser.
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