Coronavirus: Minnesota trooper issues N95 masks to speeding doctor instead of ticket

This was a traffic stop worth remembering.

A doctor pulled over for speeding by a Minnesota state trooper did not get a ticket, but received something more valuable -- five N95 medical masks.

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“I burst into tears,” Sarosh Ashraf Janjua, a Boston native who works at a coronavirus quarantine unit in Duluth, wrote on Facebook. “I think he teared up a little as well before wishing me well and walking away.”

Janjua was headed toward Minneapolis for a break March 21, when she was pulled over for speeding on Interstate 35, the Star-Tribune reported.

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Trooper Brian Schwartz told Janjua she should have known better and took her license back to his patrol car, CNN reported.

“Feeling thoroughly chastised, I waited for him to write me a ticket,” Janjua wrote on Facebook. “Instead, he told me he was going to let me off with a warning.”

When Schwartz handed the license back, he also pressed five N95 masks into her hand, the Star-Tribune reported.

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Schwartz decided to offer his masks after noticing Janjua had two used N95 masks in her purse, "that he assumed she was reusing,” the Minnesota State Patrol said in a statement to CNN.

“This complete stranger, who owed me nothing and is more on the front lines than I am, shared his precious masks with me, without my even asking,” Janjua wrote on Facebook. “The veil of civilization may be thin, but not all that lies behind it is savage. We are going to be OK.”

“Thank you to Sarosh for her hard work and dedication,” the Minnesota State Patrol wrote on its Facebook page. “Troopers are working hard during the pandemic and are thinking about all the first responders who are caring for Minnesotans during this critical time.”

To Janjua, the trooper’s act was a selfless one and bolstered her confidence in the public’s resolve against the pandemic.

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“I think we are all just hanging on to something that makes us feel safe,” Janjua told CNN. “Somehow, for Americans, that something has become N95 masks and toilet paper. Trooper Schwartz’s act of kindness became my something.”