YOU WERE ‘CHERISHED’
Loving kin bury 8-yr.-old ‘left to freeze’
The older brother of Long Island 8-year-old Thomas Valva kissed his sibling’s tiny white casket as he bade a final farewell on Thursday to the child who was allegedly left to die in a freezing garage by their NYPD cop dad.
The touching moment came after roughly 100 family, friends and even strangers moved by the horrific tragedy attended a funeral service at the St. Elizabeth Church in Melville for Thomas.
Thomas, who was autistic, died of hypothermia on Jan. 17 after his police-officer father, Michael Valva, 40, and Valva’s fiancée, Angelina Pollina, 42, allegedly left him in their unheated Center Moriches garage overnight.
The boy’s mother, Justyna Zubko-Valva, bent down in the church alongside her surviving sons, Anthony, 10, and Andrew, 6, to also kiss the casket holding Thomas’ body.
In his homily, Bishop Andrzej Zglejszewski told mourners: “Thomas was just a little boy. He just wanted to be loved, wanted to be hugged, wanted to be cherished, he wanted to be wanted. He was a gift.”
The bishop,, who had baptized the youngster, declared d that “our system”” had “failed” Thomas, omas, alluding to ZubkoubkoValva’s allegations ations that authori- ties ignored claims that her kids were being abused. “Our legal and social system failed him,” Zglejszewski said. “I am sorry to say that somehow we failed him.” Valva and Pollina were charged with second-degree murder in Thomas’ death after cops said the couple tortured the child and subjected him to “freezing temperatures” in the garage while it was only 19 degrees outside. Zubko-Valva, who says she “unlawfully” lost custody of Thomas and her two other sons in 2017 amid a bitter divorce battle with Valv Valva, read from the Bible’s Book of Revelation during the service.
“In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places . . . Where I am going you know the way,” she read.
Her son, Anthony, also read from the Bible.
“Good is the Lord to the one who waits for him,” the 10-yearold read.
Mourners in the church included Suffolk County Executive Steve Bellone, who this week announced that the county was launching an investigation into how its Department of Social Services handled the case involving Thomas.
Thomas was buried at the St. Charles Cemetery in East Farmingdale, where loved ones laid roses on the boy’s casket and where Anthony kissed it goodbye.