New Fairfield veteran home at last
Rob Ryser
Updated 10:04 pm, Tuesday, November 25, 2014
1 of 8 - Lou Russo, 96, sits in the living room of his New Fairfield, Conn, home on Tuesday, November 25, 2014. Russo, a World War II veteran, who had been kept out of his New Fairfield house for 16 months, returned by Veterans Day, thanks to the settlement of a knotty legal dispute in state Superior Court in Danbury. Photo: H John Voorhees III
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NEW FAIRFIELD -- When Lou Russo sits down to count his blessings on Thanksgiving Day, the first thing out of his mouth will probably be a joke.
After all, the 96-year-old World War II veteran is feeling more like himself now that he is out of the nursing home where he was confined against his will for 17 months -- and back in the home he built with his own hands.
But when Russo does get serious and gives thanks for the things he has, his independence will be at the top of his list.
"Oh, you get that feeling of freedom," said Russo, who was discharged from the nursing home and brought to his remodeled house on Monday. "You get that feeling of freedom when you go out the front door that nobody is going to grab you."
What makes Russo's Thanksgiving story extraordinary is how volunteers he had never met fought for his freedom, much in the same way that he fought 70 years ago in Papua and New Guinea for people he had never met.
"He is a gem -- they don't make them like him anymore," says Dan Gaita, a former Marine and the founder of a combat veteran's charity in Bethel, who has been one of Russo's key advocates. "I've never witnessed anything as bad as this."
Gaita is referring to the helpless condition he found Russo in two months ago, after a court-appointed conservator had spent Russo's life savings and rented out his home to a family of four.
There was Russo, a former contractor and bachelor who had been independent all his life, racking up bills in a nursing home he could not afford when he could have stayed free in a veteran's home.
Russo got into his predicament after a fall at his home 17 months ago. A social worker saw an unrepaired ceiling and the clutter in his home as evidence that he could no longer take care of himself. The Housatonic Probate Court gave a conservator named Mark Broadmeyer authority over Russo's finances and health care, leaving him without a voice in his own life.
Just when Russo felt he would never get free and would die in the nursing home, his story became public and volunteers came to his rescue.
Gaita contacted politicians, police and the press to pressure the Housatonic Probate Court to restore Russo's dignity.
Probate Court Judge Martin Landgrebe ordered Broadmeyer to evict the people in Russo's home. Broadmeyer quit. The judge called in Danbury lawyer Dean Lewis to be the new conservator, and Lewis struck an out-of-court deal with the renters to leave in five days.
That gave Gaita and a handful of local contractors who donated their time and materials three weeks to get Russo's house in shape for a Veteran's Day homecoming. Meanwhile, his friend Denise Toomey worked with staff at the Pope John Paul II Center nursing home in Danbury to arrange for his discharge.
Although the volunteers met their deadline and brought Russo home for a flag-filled Veteran's Day welcome-home party, a chair lift had yet to be installed on his stairs. He had to spend another few weeks in the nursing home.
"I am just glad he is home and everything is on the right track," Toomey said Monday after bringing Russo home to 11 Hammond Road, where neighbors gave him another welcome-home party. "It is has been a long haul for him and it's been overwhelming."
Russo has admitted to Toomey and Gaita that it will be a challenge to live with a home health aide, but he is grateful to have his life back.
"I just got here and they already gave me a bowl of soup," a cheerful Russo said upon his return. "They really did a grand job."
rryser@newstimes.com; 203-731-3342
After all, the 96-year-old World War II veteran is feeling more like himself now that he is out of the nursing home where he was confined against his will for 17 months -- and back in the home he built with his own hands.
But when Russo does get serious and gives thanks for the things he has, his independence will be at the top of his list.
"Oh, you get that feeling of freedom," said Russo, who was discharged from the nursing home and brought to his remodeled house on Monday. "You get that feeling of freedom when you go out the front door that nobody is going to grab you."
What makes Russo's Thanksgiving story extraordinary is how volunteers he had never met fought for his freedom, much in the same way that he fought 70 years ago in Papua and New Guinea for people he had never met.
"He is a gem -- they don't make them like him anymore," says Dan Gaita, a former Marine and the founder of a combat veteran's charity in Bethel, who has been one of Russo's key advocates. "I've never witnessed anything as bad as this."
There was Russo, a former contractor and bachelor who had been independent all his life, racking up bills in a nursing home he could not afford when he could have stayed free in a veteran's home.
Russo got into his predicament after a fall at his home 17 months ago. A social worker saw an unrepaired ceiling and the clutter in his home as evidence that he could no longer take care of himself. The Housatonic Probate Court gave a conservator named Mark Broadmeyer authority over Russo's finances and health care, leaving him without a voice in his own life.
Just when Russo felt he would never get free and would die in the nursing home, his story became public and volunteers came to his rescue.
Gaita contacted politicians, police and the press to pressure the Housatonic Probate Court to restore Russo's dignity.
Probate Court Judge Martin Landgrebe ordered Broadmeyer to evict the people in Russo's home. Broadmeyer quit. The judge called in Danbury lawyer Dean Lewis to be the new conservator, and Lewis struck an out-of-court deal with the renters to leave in five days.
That gave Gaita and a handful of local contractors who donated their time and materials three weeks to get Russo's house in shape for a Veteran's Day homecoming. Meanwhile, his friend Denise Toomey worked with staff at the Pope John Paul II Center nursing home in Danbury to arrange for his discharge.
Although the volunteers met their deadline and brought Russo home for a flag-filled Veteran's Day welcome-home party, a chair lift had yet to be installed on his stairs. He had to spend another few weeks in the nursing home.
"I am just glad he is home and everything is on the right track," Toomey said Monday after bringing Russo home to 11 Hammond Road, where neighbors gave him another welcome-home party. "It is has been a long haul for him and it's been overwhelming."
Russo has admitted to Toomey and Gaita that it will be a challenge to live with a home health aide, but he is grateful to have his life back.
"I just got here and they already gave me a bowl of soup," a cheerful Russo said upon his return. "They really did a grand job."
rryser@newstimes.com; 203-731-3342
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