NYC Man Dies after Elderly Mom Pulls Him from Fire
By Kerry Burke
Source New York Daily News
A city Transportation Department worker died in a Bronx fire Monday night despite the desperate efforts of his elderly mother to save him, the victim’s family said.
The victim, identified by family members as John DeFano, 58, died after a two-alarm blaze broke out at his house on Turneur Ave. near Lacombe Ave. in Castle Hill just after 7:40 p.m.
“His 88-year-old mother pulled him out of the house, and that alone is amazing,” said a relative, Charles Johnson. “Unfortunately, he didn’t make it.”
Medics took DeFano to Jacobi Hospital in critical condition, but he couldn’t be saved. Firefighters brought the flames under control about 9:35 p.m., FDNY officials said.
DeFano worked as a traffic device maintainers supervisor, according to public records. Family and neighbors said he had become disabled in recent years.
“He was a good man who loved animals,” Johnson said. “He was reclusive, and he had health problems.”
His mother was visiting from the Catskills in upstate New York, he said.
“She’s going to be devastated. He is her only child,” he said.
FDNY sources said the interior of the house was in disarray. The cause of the blaze was under investigation.
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