Mandeville – After the shock of losing her husband, Tracy Liberto faced the fear that she might have to sell the family home.
“How was I going to tell my kids, who just lost their father,” she said, “that they were also going to lose the house they grew up in?”
Mandeville Police Captain Vincent Liberto Jr. was shot and killed after a high-speed car chase near the approach to the South Causeway on September 20. This week, the suspected gunman, 21 year-old Mark Spicer, was indicted by a grand jury.
But also this week, “The Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation,” named for a firefighter who was killed during the 9/11 terrorist attack in New York, announced that the group had paid off the mortgage on Capt. Liberto’s home.
Since 2015, the Foundation’s “Fallen First Responder Home Program” has been offering families of slain first responders the chance to stay in their homes in spite of losing their loved one’s income. The Liberto home is the fifth home in the Foundation’s “Season Of Hope,” in which the Foundation has committed to saving one home every day until Christmas Eve– 24 homes in all.
Tracey Liberto says the fear of losing her family’s home was “erased” when she got the news that her mortgage had been paid in full.
“Words can’t express how thankful we are,” she said. “My heart is forever grateful.”
For more information about The Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation, go to tunnel2towers.org.
