A Vietnam vet found dead and badly decomposed Saturday in his garbage-strewn Brooklyn apartment after neighbors repeatedly complained of a foul smell was alive as recently as April, cops revealed yesterday.
Police went to James Gale’s apartment at Breukelen Houses in Canarsie three times on “complaints of a foul odor” between January and April, said NYPD spokesman Paul Brown.
In each case, “it was determined that the source of the odor was the occupant’s medical condition, which included gangrene,” Brown said. “In one instance, medical assistance was rendered, and in other instances declined.”
Cops went to Gale’s apartment a fourth time Saturday because of the foul odor, and found the 62-year-old dead.
Neighbors said they had not seen Gale — who developed gangrene from a decades-old subway accident — since January, and that they complained to city agencies for months about the stench.
“While the matter is still under investigation, it can be said that [Housing Authority] management and our social-services unit made repeated attempts to contact and assist Mr. Gale,” said authority spokesman Howard Marder.