John Stephen is not the typical candidate for a deadly heart attack.
“I work out almost every day. Run a couple of miles a day. I eat well, and my weight has been constant for years,” the 63-year-old GOP Executive Councilor told NHJournal on Tuesday.
And yet on Sunday morning, Nov. 30, he was bent over and gasping for breath on a Florida sidewalk. Soon he would be in an ambulance. And then his heart would stop beating.
“They told me at one point I had no pulse.”
Stephen does not remember much about what happened after he left the house on Anna Maria Island, just off Florida’s west coast, where he and his wife, Jenny, were vacationing.
“I told my wife I was going for a run around 6:30 or 7:00 in the morning, like I normally do. I started running, and after that, it’s a total fog. I don’t remember anything until I woke up in the hospital. Both my daughters were standing over me, and they were praying,” Stephen said.
“That’s when I knew something really bad had happened.”
Fortunately — or perhaps miraculously — the bad thing happened when Stephen was around some very good people: Abbie and Mark Batia.
“They literally saved my life,” Stephen said.
Abbie and Mark live in Orlando, but spent Thanksgiving on the island with family. Mark, a construction manager, said that typically, he and his wife would have gone on a morning run and would have been nowhere near Stephen that fateful day. But at the last second, Abbie decided on a long walk with the dogs instead. And, in a very unusual move, she stopped at one of Mark’s construction sites to use the facilities — a porta-potty — something she is very reluctant to do.
The result was that the Batias reached Stephen just as he was collapsing on the sidewalk.
“I immediately knew something was wrong,” Mark said. “Sometimes you see people lying on the ground, stretching, or even resting. Not this time. He was clearly in trouble. I called 911 and ran right to him.”
When Abbie and Mark reached Stephen, he was struggling to breathe. In another fortuitous bit of timing, Mark had recently completed CPR training as part of his OSHA construction manager certification. But he was not sure whether he should start CPR while Stephen was still breathing, even if erratically.
That problem solved itself.
“He gasped really loud, and then he stopped breathing. My wife said, ‘Oh, gosh, he died. He just died!’ So I started CPR.”
With the help of the 911 operator on the phone (“She was amazing. Poised and kind, but very direct”), Mark performed CPR until emergency medical technicians arrived and took over.
“They used the defibrillation paddles on him, and I asked one of the EMTs, ‘Does he have a pulse? Is he breathing?’ She said no. They shocked him again, and the EMT gave us a thumbs up.”
Stephen was taken to the hospital, but Abbie and Mark still did not know who he was. They noticed Stephen had earbuds, so they started looking for his phone.
“Abbie kept asking, ‘Who is his family? Do they know what happened?’ Nobody could answer.”
They gave the phone to the EMTs and then went home, not knowing Stephen’s fate — or even his name.
It did not take long, however, for word of Stephen’s heart attack to reach New Hampshire politics.
“I found out about John later that Sunday. It was devastating,” said Councilor Dave Wheeler (R-Milford). “He’s someone who’s always been in good health. Nobody saw it coming.”
It would be two weeks before Stephen’s fellow councilors were allowed to speak to him. Until then, members of his family kept the council updated on his condition. Asked whether the council ever considered making contingency plans for an extended absence — or possibly worse — Wheeler dismissed the notion.
“I had bypass surgery of my own in 2021. We’ve had absences before. We were just focused on getting John back.”
Gov. Kelly Ayotte, who also monitored Stephen’s case and stayed in touch with the family, called him “a fighter.”
“Even through his recovery, John is sharp as a tack and focused on helping our state, and I am so grateful to have his help and advice. Joe and I are continuing to pray for him, Jenny, and the entire Stephen family. I’m glad he is on the mend, and I’m looking forward to having him back at the council table in person soon,” Ayotte said.
Stephen is ready to get back, too. He says he is still “numb” when he thinks about what happened.
“I mean, I never had any symptoms, anything. But I learned something — this could happen to anyone at any time.”
And he is not the first member of his family to experience it.
“My grandfather died of a heart attack at age 29. My dad was just 2 years old when it happened.”
Wheeler says Stephen is an important part of the conservative Republican majority on the council and has earned a reputation as a detail-oriented watchdog who is tough on state agencies and their spending. His time as DHHS commissioner gives him expertise in health care and child services contracts.
“He’s very thorough,” Wheeler said.
So will Stephen’s brush with death soften him when it comes to spending?
“No,” Stephen laughed. “I’m still a fiscal hawk.”
Mark and Abbie Batia with Executive Councilor John Stephen on Anna Maria Island, Fla.
A few days after the heart attack, Abbie and Mark got a phone call from Manatee County police.
“Did you give CPR to somebody this past Sunday? Would you mind if we gave your name and number to the family?”
They agreed and were a little nervous — they still did not know what happened or who the man was they had helped — but “you could tell from the officer’s voice that it was good news.”
“She told us, ‘I can’t wait for you to talk to them,’” Mark said.
Soon came the first of several phone calls, followed by a face-to-face meeting. For Stephen, it was an emotional moment.
“When we met, Mark put his hand on my shoulder and said, ‘John, you’re not supposed to be here. This was a miracle.’ And he was right.”
Mark said he was moved as well.
“I’m a person of deep faith. I believe God orchestrates all things,” he said. “I told him how amazing it was to touch someone who had been raised from the dead.”
“I want to thank the amazing couple who stopped to save John’s life,” Ayotte said. “Truly a miracle they were at the right place at the right time when John needed them.”
The experience has inspired Stephen to explore ways to promote more CPR training in New Hampshire.
“CPR is so critical and important. I want to expand CPR training across the state. That’s definitely one thing I want to do.”
While his health issues have not changed his politics, they might slow him down, at least temporarily — something Wheeler hopes is the case.
“When we spoke to him two weeks after it happened, we told him we knew what his priorities are, especially on the 10-year highway plan, and we would take care of it. We said, ‘John, you need to slow down.’”
“But I’m not sure John Stephen is a ‘slow down’ kind of guy,” Wheeler admitted.
Stephen says he plans to attend the upcoming Executive Council meeting on Jan. 7.
