An American flag that had been donated to the family of Jonathan Ielpi, a Great Neck firefighter who was killed during the September 11 terrorist attacks, was returned to his sister’s Huntington Station on Friday after it had been stolen three days earlier.
“I don’t know who took it or why. I guess they had their reasons,” Melissa Ielpi-Brengel said on Facebook. “I am just glad that their [conscience] got the best of them and they did the right thing by returning it.”
The flag, which had been donated to Brengel by the September 11 Families Association, was returned to her house on the morning of July 4 with a note that read “I am so sorry, I had no idea,” according to Brengel’s Facebook page.
“It was outside the house when we woke up,” she said.
Brengel said on July 1 that the American flag and the pole that held it in place outside her house had been stolen.
“At some point between 10:30 p.m. last night (June 30), and 5:15 a.m. this morning (July 1), someone stole the flag and pole from the front of the house,” she said. “Our flag was the only one on my block that was taken, our neighbors flags are still flying proud.”
The flag, Brengel said, “flew over the World Trade Center site during the recovery and clean up.”
Jonathan Ielpi, who was a member of the Great Neck Vigilant fire company, was in the South tower at the time it collapsed.
Brengel said the stolen flag was one of many that had been donated to the families of the victims of the terrorist attack.
“The flag is very special to me and my family not only because it is an American flag, but also because of where the flag once flew,” she said.
In her Facebook post, Brengel said she did not expect to get the flag back, but wanted to prevent the theft of other American flags in her neighborhood.
But after a social media frenzy and multiple news reports, the anonymous thief returned the flag to her house on July 4.
“Thank you all for spreading the word and helping us get our flag back,” Brengel wrote on Facebook. “You guys are all amazing.”
During the time the flag had been missing, Squad 288, where Jonathan Ielpi had worked as a firefighter at the time of the terrorist attacks, donated a framed American flag that had also flown above the World Trade Center site, Brengel said on Facebook.
“We will proudly display it in the house,” she said.
A Great Neck park was named the “Jonathan Ielpi Firefighter’s Park” in honor of the fallen firefighter. A statue of Jonathan stands in the park.
Last year, the reality show “Princesses: Long Island” sparked outrage after Great Neck resident Amanda Bertoncini and a photographer had a model make provocative poses with the statue and feed it alcohol.
“It opens up the wounds and it just makes you want to cry all over again,” Brengel told PIX 11 last year.
