July 31, 2005

BY FRANK MAIN Crime Reporter

It’s easy for other cops to relate to Vito Friscia, a New York police detective suffering from severe sinus problems after spending months in the debris from the collapse of the World Trade Center.

The good-natured Friscia, an 18-year veteran, is an expert at blocking out the bad things that come with the job.

In the documentary, “Vito After,” which premiered Saturday at Indiefest in Chicago, Friscia laughs a lot. He explains it’s his way to “cover up.”

Yet “Vito After” doesn’t let Friscia cover up anything.

The 47-minute film follows Friscia from his early coughing fits to the doctor’s office, where we see the CAT scans of his horribly inflamed sinus cavity. We later learn he ignores his doctor’s advice and chooses not to have surgery.

We sit in a Mexican restaurant with his fellow detectives, who had also sifted through the Ground Zero rubble hauled to the Fresh Kills Landfill on Staten Island to search for human remains, credit cards and anything else that might place a victim at the scene. During their dinner, one detective starts hacking and another one chuckles, “It’s the WTC cough!”

Many of the detectives at the table have gotten sick after 9/11 — and one of them recently had a tumor removed from his heart. They’re not alone: In a New York City study released in November, thousands of people in the vicinity of the towers on Sept. 11, 2001, reported having increased respiratory problems and suffering higher rates of emotional distress.

He, wife in constant touch

The film, by Friscia’s sister-in-law Maria Pusateri, deftly shifts from his cop family to his biological family. Friscia’s voice cracks as he declares he has grown more in love with his wife, Lisa, since the tragedy. He believes he would have died in the collapse if he had arrived at the scene five minutes earlier. Now his wife keeps constant tabs on where he is, and he does the same with her.

“Anytime anything bad happens in Brooklyn [or] Queens, he gets beeped,” she says.

She adds, “Instead of getting three phone calls a day, I now get 10.”

The film also takes us to the soccer field where Friscia coaches his daughter’s team, and we join the family on their boat as they fish for flounder — his “therapy.”

“Vito After” drew a sparse audience at the Landmark Century Theater, where it was screened with several other films. Still, it drew praise from Chicago Police Officer Deanna Maldonado, who had volunteered at Ground Zero for two days.

“Police officers act like tough guys,” Maldonado said. “I know exactly how he laughs things off.”

But she said the film exposed a side of Friscia that the public rarely sees.

“Those were real emotions,” said Maldonado, who thinks other Chicago Police officers — and their bosses — ought to watch the film.

“The brass should be the first to see it,” she said.

Other Indiefest screenings of “Vito After” will be at 7 p.m. Monday at Le Meridian, 521 N. Rush, and 2 p.m. Wednesday at Landmark Century Theater, 2828 N. Clark. Admission is $10.

(source)