Boston, MA : Winchester selectman killed in Massachusetts crash on Tuesday, August 15, 2017
A Winchester selectman is being remembered as a dedicated and selfless community member after he died in a truck crash in Massachusetts Tuesday morning.
Robert Leustek was killed in the crash.
"The town lost an amazing person," selectmen Chairman Ben Kilanski said.
According to the Northwestern (Mass.) District Attorney's Office, based in Northampton, Leustek, 46, was driving a dump truck on Jacksonville Road in Colrain, Mass., when the vehicle left the road at approximately 8 a.m. and struck a house.
The home, in the center of town, was vacant, and the truck hit it head-on, the Greenfield (Mass.) Recorder reported. Colrain is a small town on the Massachusetts-Vermont border.
According to Mary Carey, a spokeswoman for the Northwestern (Mass.) District Attorney's Office, Colrain Police and Massachusetts State Police are investigating the crash.
Massachusetts State Police Sgt. Nicole Morrell said the cause of the crash is still under investigation and declined to comment further until the investigation is completed. Colrain Fire Chief Nicholas Anzuoni said in the Greenfield Recorder report that the 10-wheeler likely lost its brakes. According to the report, several other trucks have gone out of control in the same area in recent years. Chief Anzuoni was unreachable for comment this morning.
Kilanski described Leustek, who was elected to the board of selectmen in March, as a "great man with a big heart." Kilanski and fellow Selectman Jack Marsh lowered the American flag outside Winchester Town Hall to half mast Tuesday in Leustek's honor.
"His service and dedication to our town will be irreplaceable," Kilanski said.
Leustek was very active in the Winchester community, according to Robert Patton-Spruill, who served alongside him on Winchester's revitalization and economic development committee.
Leustek and his wife, Gloria, moved to Winchester in 2014, according to a story in the Brattleboro Reformer. As of a February report in The Sentinel, he worked as a driver for Bob's Fuel Company, LLC. He also sold produce through his business, Porcupine Acres, with his wife at the weekly farmer's market they helped found in Winchester, according to Kevin Bazan, chairman of the Winchester school board
Patton-Spruill said Leustek was always trying to improve Winchester. He described Leustek's death as one of the worst things that could have happened to the town.
"He was an amazing man, definitely one of our great town fathers. It’s a shocking tragedy for all of us here in Winchester," said Patton-Spruill.
Leustek was also volunteering his time to restore the historic clock in the tower at Center Church, which was originally installed in the Winchester Meeting House. He didn't have any previous experience in antique clockwork, but took on the project anyway.
Bazan said Leustek often gave his time to make Winchester a better place to live. Leustek even drove to Keene periodically to borrow cameras from CheshireTV so he could record school board meetings to post online, Bazan said.
"He would do anything anybody asked of him on the town level because he loved Winchester and this community more than a lot of people I know who have lived here their entire lives," he said.
For Patton-Spruill, who owns New England Sweetwater Distillery across the street from Center Church, the clock Leustek was restoring has gained even more significance with his death.
"From where I am at the distillery, I stare over at that clock everyday, and I think of him. And now it’s just got a whole new meaning to me," he said.
Sarah Horton, who owns the Cuts on Main salon in downtown Winchester, echoed Patton-Spruill and Bazan when she spoke of Leustek's impact on the town.
"It's a huge loss, of course, to his wife, family and those who loved him," she said. "But it is also a huge loss to the town of Winchester."
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Winchester selectman killed in Massachusetts crash