BARNHART, Mo. – Friends and family gathered at the Parkton Park basketball courts Sunday night to hold a vigil for Nicholas Gusmano, who was found dead in a Richmond Heights home Saturday. Gusmano was 30.
Richmond Heights police were called to a home near Bellevue and Dale avenue for a possible burglary in progress. When they arrived on scene, they found a broken window with blood on it. Police would find a man deceased in the bathroom of the home which was later identified as Gusmano.
“He tried to find someone to help and he ended up in the situation that he was in. He wasn’t trying to hurt anybody,” Gabriella, Gusmano’s sister, said. “He was trying to hide or find someone to help them, wasn’t trying to hurt anything.”
Gusmano’s mother, Stephanie, said Nicholas had a lengthy medical and mental health history. He was diagnosed with a rare disease and bi-polar disorder and schizophrenia. He would tell his family he often felt like people were chasing him and he needed to get away.
Stephanie said two years ago, Nicholas had told her was running from something and broke a window at a church to seek help. His family argues he means no harm and never got violent, but the mental illness would cause him to react.
Nicholas was described as a caring and selfless person who was willing to help anyone, despite what he was going through.
“He always had a smile on his face, and he was just a great person that everyone and anyone who was around him, he’d give the shirt off the back of his back for you,” said Nicholas’s best friend, Bryce.
Stephanie reported Nicholas missing on Friday when no one heard from him. She learned he’d visited a hospital seeking treatment, but they released him shortly after he checked in. Stephanie said hospitals would typically turn Nicholas away due to his “complex” diagnosis of disorders and diseases.
“He would be in the hospital and we would be there with him, they would ensure us that they would never let him leave knowing he’s a danger to himself and then we’d get a phone call that he was released and she’d have to go get them,” Leslie Wood, Nicholas’ godmother and aunt, said. “We would call around to different facilities and no one was willing to take him with the medical condition.”
The Gusmano family hopes more mental health resources become available to those in the area needing them.
“Think that there’s not a place there’s not enough, there is not enough and mental health is becoming a bigger issue than it ever was,” Wood said.
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by PostX News and is published from a syndicated feed.)
