Over the last couple of years, Rheaume lived by myself and together with his fiancee. He lived inside the shelter, a tent and a rooming residence.
Like many on the road, he had a records of medication, fights, arrests, bodily ailments and intellectual fitness issues.
He had masses of issues, but money wasn’t one of them. From all bills, Rheaume died a rich man.
He had an investment account with a six-determine stability, way to a $500,000 coverage payout from a 2016 auto-pedestrian accident.
It became in a based agreement, and he turned into getting about $2,000 a month when his Social Security disability was delivered in, in line with pals.
But the cash furnished little assist.
“There’s no assist for humans with brain accidents,” said Susan McGrath, who said she was like a mother to Rheaume. She said he has stood in her apartment and struck his head at the wall, the result of stressful mind harm he suffered from the accident.
“I couldn't get Chris a caseworker, no matter how hard I attempted, and that’s what he needed,” she said.
When I spoke with McGrath and Rheaume’s fiancee, Marianne Fedele, they described the twist of fate’s toll: Blank stares. Memory loss. Low mind functioning. Abusive conduct. Use of marijuana and alcohol.
His Facebook pages (people on the street often create Facebook pages as normally as they sober up) consist of him thankful over his engagement to Fedele. They also had messages of melancholy:
“I’m going crazy.”
“Everything I do is inaccurate and I attempt my quality.”
In February, he posted an picture of a skull with a cigar clenched in its tooth, marijuana leaves on its reflector sunglasses.
He became a regular at 1269 Cafe, the Christian-based soup kitchen that operates out of the antique police station. Founder Craig Chevalier stated Rheaume joined a ten-week, religion-based totally workshop with the wish of setting up a effective dating with Fedele.
“He turned into doing all the things he ought to do to tug his lifestyles collectively,” Chevalier stated.
He said Rheaume didn’t display as much as 1269 Cafe on pills, and Chevalier thought Rheaume had positioned pills at the back of him.
Despite the plain cognitive problems, Rheaume changed into smart sufficient to put his cash in a dependent agreement and have a payee control the money, Chevalier said.
Chevalier lost music of Rheaume for awhile, and he became surprised to listen that he ended up at New Horizons refuge. Last he knew, Rheaume changed into sharing an condo with Fedele.
According to paperwork that McGrath and Fedele confirmed me, Rheaume and his lawyer, Michael Craig, signed a $500,000 settlement settlement in January 2018.
He’d lose a third to felony costs, and Medicare – which paid for his care after the accident – could get a piece.
Craig said he could not speak specifics of his client’s case. But speaking in generalities, Craig said clients can opt for a structured settlement to assure a coins go with the flow and preserve a few cost of their agreement.
As with all people, distribution of Rheaume’s estate will come to be in probate court docket, he stated.
“It became a sad case. This is all very unhappy,” Craig said.
A pinnacle reliable at New Horizons said she could not discuss Rheaume, however the shelter did now not dispute a current dying there.
Homeless people are more likely to be afflicted by brain injury than the normal population, stated Stephany Savard, chief working officer of Families in Transition, which operates the refuge.
“It doesn’t depend how a lot cash someone has. These are large obstacles in someone’s lives,” she said.
With federal grants, New Horizons is more than doubling the number of social workers at the safe haven, hoping to provide the case management that McGrath stated she couldn’t locate for Rheaume.
Social employees will use strategies, together with motivational interviewing and energy-based modeling to work with the homeless. The attempt is to convert their street smarts to task and existence capabilities.
Staff is being employed and skilled, and Savard stated the whole thing may be up and going for walks in six months to a 12 months. Of direction, that’s too overdue for Rheaume.
Meanwhile, Rheaume’s body remains on the New Hampshire Medical Examiner’s morgue.
McGrath stated Rheaume’s brother, George, would be the subsequent of family members who would take ownership of the frame. But he’s hard to discover and doesn’t have the cash for a cremation, McGrath stated. The Medical Examiner’s Office said own family is making preparations.
McGrath and Fedele said Rheaume’s estate will visit his 10-year-antique son, who is being followed through his mom’s sister. They said Rheaume turned into adamant about putting him up as beneficiary.
“He were given into fights because of his upbringing,” McGrath said, “I love Chris. It breaks my heart this took place to him, however he’s in a higher location now.”