Community Comes Together To Help Friend After Fall

SOUTHAMPTON, NY — Bill Sutton was celebrating good news and looking forward to his new home when a bad fall left him seriously injured.

Joseph Shaw set up a GoFundMe, "Help Bill Sutton Over An Obstacle," and the campaign has raised $1,895 of its $5,000 goal so far.

"My good friend and colleague Bill Sutton, director of digital media at the Press News Group, suffered an awful accident — at just the worst possible time," Shaw wrote.

"Bill was staying with a friend on Thursday night, in an unfamiliar house, when he got up in the middle of the night and fell down a stairway. Fortunately, his friend is a paramedic: She found him unconscious and badly hurt, but stabilized him and got him to the hospital. He was then flown by helicopter to Stony Brook University Hospital, a Level 1 trauma unit."

He added, "Bill is currently in the intensive care unit at Stony Brook. In the fall he suffered various injuries, but the worst are three broken vertebrae in his neck (C1, C2 and C3) and a bleed in his brain, which appears to be small. The good news: He his awake, alert and does not appear to have any damage to his spinal cord. He can move, and he's completely intact — although he's currently got a breathing tube in and can only communicate via hand gestures and written notes."

The unfortunate thing, Shaw said, is that Sutton was in the process of closing on a new house in Riverhead, and was staying with a friend because that closing is still a few weeks out. In fact, his mortgage was approved the day he fell, Shaw said, and Sutton was thrilled at the news.

"He's going to be hospitalized for some time, and faces a pretty long recovery after that as well. We thought that, because of the nature of his injuries and the fact that the doctors and nurses discourage visitors to the ICU — and because flowers and cards are nice, but they really won't help him get back to normal — we'd set up this GoFundMe page to let people make small donations, whatever you can afford, and send a note of love and support to Bill."

Sutton, Shaw said, has insurance and vacation time, but expenses for co-pays and other medical issues will mount.

"Also, his beloved dogs, Schottze and Cole, are being well cared for at the Southampton Animal Shelter, in a special emergency spot, where they can be together and be among people who already know them and care about them — but there are costs associated with that. Finally, it's going to make his move into a new house a little challenging. Any help we can provide financially will be appreciated."

To donate, click here.

Photo courtesy of GoFundMe.