Tunnel to Towers pays off mortgages of fallen and injured first responders from LI and elsewhere

The families of more than a dozen first responders, including five from Long Island, were among those whose mortgages were paid off this year by Tunnel to Towers, the nonprofit announced Wednesday.

Among those to receive the payments are families of seven NYPD officers, four FDNY firefighters, two New Jersey police officers and one federal correction officer. Nine of the families had lost loved ones due to 9/11 cancers and other illnesses. The five others are families of first responders injured or killed in the line of duty.

"These 14 families will start 2022 without the financial burden of a mortgage thanks to the overwhelming generosity of American this year, the 20th anniversary of the Sept. 11th attack," Tunnel to Towers officials said in a prepared statement. .

The Long Island families are from Commack, Greenlawn, North Bellmore, Sayville and St. James, the foundation said.

The nonprofit group was originally started to help the families of first responders lost on Sept. 11 but it expanded this year to cover mortgage payments on homes of those responders who had died or suffer from illnesses believed to have been caused by the toxic aftereffects of the terror attacks.

The fund also said it was covering the mortgages of three officers, including two NYPD detectives and an Atlantic City, N.J. police officer, who had suffered catastrophic injuries in the line of duty.

One of the cops hurt was Thomas Mitchell, an NYPD detective who was responding in his vehicle to a robbery in progress within the 101 Precinct in the Rockaways just before Memorial Day in 1994, when he got into a accident. Mitchell, 47 who lives in Sayville, said Wednesday in a telephone interview that the crash left him a quadriplegic and that he is driven around when needed by the department.

"It's a great thing they do," said Mitchell of the foundation. "It takes a burden off me and I can put my daughter through college."

Another NYPD detective who suffered injuries was Terrence McGhee, 61, whose address was not provided, who had been a member of the NYPD/Terrorist Task Force when he suffered a spinal cord injury in July 2008 while on overseas duty. Still a member of the department, McGhee, who was blessed at Ground Zero during a visit by Pope Francis in 2015, said he was deeply moved by the Tunnel to Towers grant.

"Having the mortgage for our home paid off is an overwhelming emotional experience," McGhee, a 34 year veteran of the NYPD, said in a prepared statement. "My wife, five children and nine grandchildren will never be without a roof over their heads."

The Tunnel to Towers Foundation began to commemorate the service and death of 34 year-old FDNY firefighter Stephen Siller, who ran through the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel in full gear on 9/11 responding to the terror attacks. Officials said the nonprofit has paid off 200 mortgages in 2021.

By Anthony M. DeStefano

tony.destefano@newsday.comtonynewsday

Anthony M. DeStefano has been a reporter for Newsday since 1986 and covers law enforcement, criminal justice and legal affairs from its New York City offices.