A University of Nebraska Omaha student credited with stopping another student with a knife last summer will be honored for his actions Tuesday.
Army Sgt. 1st Class Brandon Valle, a senior at UNO, will be presented with the U.S. Army Commendation Medal, which is awarded for acts of heroism, meritorious achievement or meritorious service, in a ceremony Tuesday morning at UNO.
The award is for “an act of courage that protected his fellow students,” UNO said in a prepared statement.
KMTV also talked to Valle in May 2015 after the arrest of a student accused of having multiple knives in the university’s library.
Valle said he asked the student, later identified as Leo Labogen, to take a loud cellphone conversation outside, but Labogen pulled out a knife.
“As soon as the knife came out, I just, you know, grabbed his wrist that held the knife,” Valle told KMTV at the time.
A cellphone video, which captured the incident, appeared to show Valle’s efforts to subdue Labogen as another man removed the knife.
Omaha Police arrested Labogen, who now faces one charge of terroristic threats. Investigators said Labogen was armed with three knives at the time.
According to online court records, Labogen, who plead not guilty, will have a trial before a judge in April.
