A Kenosha family lost everything in a fire this weekend. But they could not be more grateful.
That's because a father can still hug his daughter tonight and put her to bed, thanks to the actions of a homeless man.
Brian Dial has no phone, no car and no address. He spends his nights wherever friends let him sleep. Sunday night that happened to be here at a lower apartment on 61st Street in Kenosha.
He thought the upper resident might be grilling but got curious and went to check it out.
"I look up on this side, I see smoke and I'm looking like, 'Oh wow, no!'" exclaimed Dial as he recounts what happened.
Reggie Pritchett had just left his 6-year-old daughter Ma-Qeeta Pritchett asleep with her cousin so he could run an errand. When the fire started, the cousin got out but Ma-Qeeta got scared.
"I didn't leave," Ma-Qeeta said.
Instead, she hid. Ma-Qeeta pulled the blankets over her face. Downstairs Ma-Qeeta's cousin yelled for help.
"When I about right up in here I hear, 'There's a child inside the building.' So I had no shoes, no coat, no nothing on and I ran straight into this door. I get up to the top all I seen was smoke," Dial said.
Dial found Ma-Qeeta hiding in a ball on the couch under some blankets.
"Brian opened the covers up and then he snatched me and I ran downstairs," Ma-Qeeta said.
What Dial did caught the attention of neighbors and even strangers.Norgie Metzinger, a man he never met started a donation page for him when he learned Dial's kids are all in foster care partly because he is homeless.
"I feel like with his good deed and him kind of risking to save the life of a stranger, far be it from me to deny him to maybe help him get on his feet," Metzinger said.
For Dial, it's all overwhelming.
"You was like an angel walking this earth right now," Pritchett said. "You was there the right time."
"I'm glad I saved this girl," Dial said. "We're like a family now."
Besides saving Ma-Qeeta, Dial also saved the family cat, Smokey.
A benefit will be held for Reggie Pritchett's family on November 19 at the American Legion, 504 58th Street in Kenosha. You can contact them for more information at (262) 657-7464.
