BELLEVILLE, Ill. — A Metro East mailman is being called a hero by people along his route after he helped save the life of a 93-year-old veteran suffering from a stroke.
The Greenmount Station neighborhood in Belleville is the type of place where everyone looks out for each other.
“It’s like a family in this park,” John Swift said.
“You’ll notice anything different,” Sandy Korobey said. “Especially if they didn’t go to church.”
Oct. 27, the mailman noticed that 93-year-old veteran Leroy Phillips hadn’t picked up his mail in four days.
“He knows everybody in here,” Swift said. “He’s been doing it a long time.”
Concerned, the mailman quickly went to the neighbors with questions.
“The man lived for mail,” Korobey said. “He lived for packages and mail. I said, ‘Oh no, something’s wrong.’”
Neighbor Sandy Korobey and former neighborhood maintenance man John Swift knocked on the door with no luck, but they did notice a light through the window.
“I seen him laying on the floor,” Swift said. “I was able to get the window open a little bit and I called out to him, saying, 'Leroy, it’s Johnie.'”
“He had a stroke and was paralyzed,” Korobey said. “He couldn’t move one inch from where he fell. It was where he stayed for four days. How he survived without being able to move, no food, no water, no nothing. It shows you his strength.”
“If it wasn’t for the mailman, and us, he probably would’ve laid in there and died,” Swift said. “Nobody would’ve known anything about it.”
USPS officials have identified that mail carrier as Jeffrey Ballenger.
“It’s good that there’s nice people left in this world,” Swift said. “You know it at times like that.”
“He wouldn’t have made it another day,” Korobey said. “Just to pay that attention and go that extra mile: hero!”
Right now, Phillips is recovering in a hospital after experiencing some breathing issues.
He recently celebrated his 94th birthday.