Transcendients: Memorial to Healthcare Workers
Died 05 April 2020
ADIEL MONTGOMERY
RACE/ETHNICITY Hispanic
OCCUPATION Security Guard
LOCATION Brooklyn, NY
AGE 39
CONCERNS ABOUT ADEQUATE PPE? No
‘You could count on Adiel for anything’
When Griselda Bubb-Johnson couldn’t reach her friend Marva – hospitalized with Covid-19 – she called her son, Adiel Montgomery.
Montgomery, a security guard in the hospital’s emergency department, found his mother’s friend in the ICU. He then did “everything for her”, Bubb-Johnson said. When Marva was cold, he got a blanket. When she was hungry, he got food. When her phone died, he found a charger.
“Some people boast about their children, but I didn’t have to,” Bubb-Johnson said, “because everybody knew you could count on Adiel for anything.”
Montgomery doted on residents as a part-time supervisor at the Urban Resource Institute, a domestic violence shelter. He invited his godbrothers to her home for Golden State Warriors games, Thanksgiving and sometimes for his mom’s renowned oxtail stew.
Two weeks after Montgomery noted he couldn’t taste his lunch, he experienced acute chest pain. When, after 12 hours in the ER, his heart stopped “nobody could believe it,” Bubb-Johnson said.
Montgomery had been vocal about a lack of personal protective equipment for hospital security guards, according to a New York Times report. The hospital did not respond to requests for comment.
Montgomery’s 14-year-old daughter, Aaliyah, never got to say goodbye. She wrote a poem to put in the coffin.
“Don’t worry,” Bubb-Johnson told her. “He’ll read it. I promise.”
– Eli Cahan