Ed. Note: The following article is a news release provided by the Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station.

A Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station deputy is being credited with saving the life of a man who was threatening to jump off the freeway overpass at the Lake Hughes exit in Castaic on Thursday morning.

At approximately 8:53 a.m. on Thursday, Deputy Russell Deloof was driving in his patrol vehicle when he heard an emergency service call go out over his handheld radio.

There was a 26-year-old man reported to be “threatening to jump” off of the overpass on the I-5 freeway.

Being close to the reported location, Deloof rushed to the scene and saw the despondent young man perched on the edge of the overpass railing. The man was staring blankly down into the fast moving freeway traffic below him, as if he was contemplating jumping, according to Deloof.

Deloof quickly parked his patrol car and started slowly approaching the man, calmly talking to him as he walked.

The deputy told the man that “jumping was a permanent solution to a temporary problem.”

As the deputy was speaking, the 26-year-old man broke his silent gaze into the traffic and started crying.

Deloof moved slowly towards the man, continually speaking to him as he walked, and extended his hand.  The man grabbed his hand and Deloof gently pulled him away from the edge of the bridge.

The young man, a father of two children, said if it were not for the deputy’s kindness, he would have jumped.

Deputies transported him to a local hospital so he could get mental health care.