A real-life story · California, United States, 1997
Lucky Pettersen’s near-death experience
In 1997, Lucky Pettersen was 4 years old and fell into a coma because his liver was failing. His older half-brother, Jason, gave him part of his own liver, and Lucky woke up three days after the operation. He said that his great friend, a neighbor everyone called Big Gino, had walked him back from heaven. Two weeks later, Lucky’s family learned that Big Gino had died while Lucky was in the hospital.
The family told the story in a television documentary in 2000. And today a United States death index records the death of a man from the same town who was probably Big Gino. How could a boy in a coma know that his friend had died? We tell the story step by step and then look at what could be checked. If you only want the evidence, go straight to what can be checked.
Step 1
1992 to 1996 · Julian, California · Told by his family and Carl Focarelli, who owned the restaurant next door
Lucky spends hours playing with Big Gino at the restaurant next door
Lucky Pettersen was born in September 1992 in Julian, a small town in California. His parents were Dana and Bill Pettersen. He had a half-brother, Jason, who was 16 years older.
Dana had a store in town, and Lucky liked to help her. But most days he went to the restaurant next door, which was called Calico’s. There he spent hours with his great friend, whom everyone called Big Gino. The restaurant belonged to Carl Focarelli, and Big Gino was his father.
Carl used to watch them play. He says they spent hours with the toys, hardly talking.
In 1997, a few months after his fourth birthday, Lucky fell ill.
Step 2
1997 · University of California, San Diego, hospital · Told by his parents
Lucky falls into a coma, with his liver, kidneys, and brain badly damaged
First he had a fever, and his parents were told it was the flu. A week and a half later, Lucky was much worse. Dana says he seemed to be shrinking, and one day he stopped responding to her.
His parents rushed him to the University of California hospital in San Diego. On the way, Lucky kept losing consciousness and coming round. Dana thought he was going to die.
The doctors gave them a very serious diagnosis. Lucky’s liver and kidneys were failing. And his brain was swollen, so he might be left with lasting damage. Lucky fell into a coma.
Dana ran out of the room in tears and called a friend.
Step 3
That day · Told by Dana
Dana prays for someone to bring her son back
Her friend told her to pray for somebody to walk Lucky back.
Dana prayed that way. She asked that, if her son was already at heaven’s gate, someone would walk him back to her. The prayer calmed her enough to call her other children, who were grown up. One of them was Jason.
The doctors said Lucky needed a new liver within the next 12 hours.
Step 4
Those hours · UCLA Medical Center, Los Angeles · Told by the family and the surgeon
His brother Jason turns out to be the donor no one expected
A helicopter took Lucky to the nearest transplant hospital, UCLA Medical Center in Los Angeles. It was more than 100 miles away. The surgeon Ronald Busuttil remembers it like this:
“You could not find a four-year-old that was sicker than Lucky. I mean, literally, at any moment he could have died.”
No liver from a deceased donor was available. The only way out was for a living person to give him part of theirs. Lucky’s parents weren’t a match. Jason was his half-brother, so his chances of being a match were even lower than his parents’. Even so, he insisted until they tested him. An hour later, the hospital called Jason. He was a match.
Busuttil estimated that, even with the transplant, Lucky had at most a 25 or 30 percent chance of pulling through.
Step 5
The operation · Told by the documentary and the doctors
Lucky’s heart stops twice during the transplant
The surgeons removed part of Jason’s liver and put it into Lucky. According to the documentary, Lucky’s heart stopped twice during the whole ordeal, and both times they managed to revive him.
In the end, the doctors gave the family good news. The transplant had gone as well as could be expected, for both brothers.
Lucky stayed in a coma.
Step 6
Three days later · Told by his parents and Lucky
Lucky wakes up and says Big Gino walked him back from heaven
Three days after the transplant, Lucky came out of his coma. He said to his father: “I’m back.”
Later, Dana asked him how he was feeling and what he remembered of the operation. Lucky told her it had been like a dream. Big Gino had walked him back from heaven. In the documentary, Lucky tells it in his own words:
“Go back, go back, go back. It turned out to be Big Gino.”
Dana thought it was a sweet dream. No one in the family knew anything had happened to Big Gino.
Step 7
Two weeks later · Julian · Told by Carl Focarelli and Dana
Back in town, Dana learns that Big Gino had died
Two weeks later, the family came back to Julian. Dana stopped by the store, and Carl Focarelli came to talk to her. He told her his father had died.
Carl was crying. Dana asked him what had happened. Carl told her his father had died on a Thursday. According to the documentary, it was the same day Lucky fell into the coma.
Dana and Carl believe Big Gino walked Lucky back, as Dana had asked in her prayer. Carl puts it this way: “I could see my dad making a deal with somebody to do that, to save Lucky.”
The family told the whole story in a documentary in 2000, about three years later. Today it is possible to look up online when Big Gino died.
Step 8
Today · A death index
A death index records the death of a Focarelli from Julian on a Thursday in 1997
In the United States there are death indexes that can be searched online. One of them lists Eugene C. Focarelli, who lived in Julian. He was born on January 2, 1920, and died on February 6, 1997, aged 77. That day was a Thursday.
Gino can be a short form of Eugenio, the Italian for Eugene. The town is the same, and 77 is a sensible age for the father of a man who already had his own restaurant. The date fits too, a few months after Lucky turned 4. He is very probably Big Gino, but it isn’t certain.
Lucky recovered fully. In 2000 he was in third grade and loved basketball. In the documentary he says he feels Big Gino saved him and that he will remember him for the rest of his life.
No one around him knew Big Gino had died. The question remains: why did Lucky, in a coma, dream that his friend was bringing him back from heaven?
Frequently asked questions
Who was Big Gino, Lucky Pettersen’s friend?
Big Gino was the father of Carl Focarelli, who owned Calico’s, a restaurant in Julian, a small town in California. Lucky spent hours playing with him. A death index lists a Eugene C. Focarelli of Julian who died on February 6, 1997, aged 77. He is very probably Big Gino, but it isn’t certain.
What is a “Peak in Darien” case?
It is when a dying person says they see someone they believed was alive. Later it turns out that person had already died. The name comes from The Peak in Darien, an 1882 book by the writer Frances Power Cobbe, who collected cases like this. Lucky Pettersen’s case is similar, although Lucky didn’t say Big Gino was dead. There are more on the page about the book by the physicist William Barrett, who collected cases like this in 1926.
What happened to Lucky Pettersen after the transplant?
According to the 2000 documentary, Lucky recovered fully. He was in third grade and played basketball. His half-brother Jason, who gave him part of his liver, had started studying nursing.
Where this story comes from
Documentaries and interviews
- “Medical Miracle,” from the television program Beyond Chance (Viacom Productions, 2000), with Dana, Bill, Jason, and Lucky Pettersen, Carl Focarelli, and the surgeon Ronald Busuttil
Books
- Titus Rivas, Anny Dirven, and Rudolf Smit, El yo no muere (2019), the Spanish edition of The Self Does Not Die, case 6.6, which summarizes the documentary. We cite the first edition. The link goes to the English edition, where case numbers may differ.Buy the book
Case documents
- United States death index: Eugene C. Focarelli, last residence Julian, California, born January 2, 1920, died February 6, 1997, searched on AncientFacesView the record
Learn more
- Doris’s deathbed vision, a similar case from 1924Read
- John Ogle’s deathbed vision, a similar case from 1880Read
- What is a near-death experience?Read
- How we check each storyRead
Our archive
- Our transcript of the documentary, the case in Rivas’s book, our search for Big Gino’s death, and the case’s score on our five criteria, as of October 24, 2026
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