More than 100 friends and former co-workers turned out Tuesday evening attend a ceremony marking the 25th anniversary of the death of David Sutton, a Fraser firefighter who was killed while rescuing a woman from a burning apartment complex.
Many of the same people have gathered in the years following the fatal fire, but the crowd was a little larger this time around as they recognized a quarter of a century had passed since Sutton gave his life trying to save someone else’s life.
“This event brings the department together every year,” said Fraser police Capt. John Gillies, who did not work with Sutton but was on hand to honor his memory.
The crowd listened as Gillies said a few words, followed by Rob Kokko, who worked the night of the fire as part of Fraser’s firefighting force. He recalled attending the fire academy with Sutton before both became volunteer firefighters for Fraser.
“Dave was trying to do the right thing that night,” said Kokko, now a captain with the Clinton Township Fire Department. “He got in that window and stayed in that window.”
According to the Macomb Daily coverage of the incident, fire crews responded in the early-morning hours of March 4, 2000 to the O’Brien Co-op Apartments on Garfield Road south of 15 Mile Road. Heavy smoke was coming from the front door and a elderly female was sighted in an upstairs apartment window calling for help.
Sutton and Kokko ran up the stairs in an attempt to rescue the woman, Helen Aftanis, but both firefighters were confronted with heavy fire. They broke out a bathroom window, but were prevented from escaping due to the center window divider mortared into the wall that their air bottles kept catching on.
The fire flashed and ignited everything in the living room.
Sutton became unresponsive while being extracted from the building and was rushed to what is now McLaren Macomb hospital in Mount Clemens. He and Aftanis both died at the hospital.
Kokko suffered severe burns.
Investigators believe the fire was intentionally set by an area arsonist who was responsible for as many of six incident. The arsonist was never caught.
Sutton was 28 and employed as a truck driver for Twin Pines Dairy, friends said. His then-wife, Michelle, has since remarried and is the single mother of two sons, Nick and Ben Bommarito.
Michelle Bommarito said it was “heartwarming” to see Tuesday’s crowd.
“Fraser is such a good community in that they don’t forget. They were there for me from the minute it happened, and I know I could turn to any of them now and they’d still be there,” she said.
Sutton’s father, Doug, agreed.
“Every day, I think about David and what happened,” Doug Sutton said. “So yes, 25 years has been a long time. I can’t express my feelings toward everybody that has showed up and thinks about him and tries to comfort me.”
The Macomb County Chapter of the Military Order of the Purple Heart honored Sutton posthumously for his heroic effort.
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Source: American Military News
