DATE: Tuesday, May 13, 1997                 TAG: 9705130281

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B2   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY TOM HOLDEN, STAFF WRITER

DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH                    LENGTH:   39 lines

BEACH GIRL, 4, DROWNS IN MARSH NEAR HOME PEOPLE RUSH TO HELP OUT AS MOTHER, AFTER A FRANTIC SEARCH, FINDS HER DAUGHTER.

A 4-year-old girl walked out of her parents' home in Ocean Lakes Monday, wandered down to nearby Scopus Marsh, and drowned.

Shortly after 1 p.m. Kristin Brzezinski's mother noticed that her daughter had dropped from sight, and she began to look for her inside their two-story home in the 1000 block of Purrington Court.

Not finding her, the mother called police to report her missing and then began asking neighbors if they had seen Kristin. No one had. The search became increasingly frantic, and then the mother ran to the marsh, which looks like a canal.

There, in one horrifying instant, she found her daughter floating in the water.

Just then, Melissa L. Miller, a 31-year-old office manager for an Oceanfront hotel, heard a scream and ran outside to see a commotion near the water. Miller's home, in the 1000 block of Swapscott Court, is one block from Brzezinski's. Miller's back yard looks out to the marsh.

``I ran down to the water, and when I got there she was pulling her baby out,'' Miller said.

Miller, who last Friday had recertified her cardiopulmonary resuscitation certificate, said she did not know the young girl or her mother.

``I did not need to know. She was just screaming she needed help, so I helped her.''

As Miller tried to help the child breathe, some residents from across the canal saw people gathering at the water's edge. They got into a motor boat and came across. One of them was a registered nurse, and that person, along with Miller, helped out on the CPR, Miller said.

Police arrived at Swapscott Court within minutes. The volunteer rescue squad took the child to Virginia Beach General Hospital by 2:13 p.m. She was pronounced dead at 2:20. KEYWORDS: DROWNING DEATH

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