Firsthand accounts of the Latham Gold's Gym struggle and death
A man died during a struggle with Colonie police this morning at the Gold's Gym in Latham, as the Times Union reported.
It sounds like there were a handful of people in the gym at the time, and a few firsthand reports have popped up online -- which describe a crazy scene.
First from Crystal Beauchemin (@Beau511) on Twitter:
Wow: guy who was flipping out& knocking machines over at my gym this AM then tazed by police...died...&I was working out 10ft away
A string of her tweets describing the incident is embedded after the jump.
And then from Courtney Horan, who posted an account on her blog:
Then he ran down the stairs, backwards mind you, and ran through the lower level of the gym, screaming and making a couple loops before going out the door. Somebody tried locking the doors after that, but he stormed back in, continuing on with his rage. Luckily someone managed to dial 911.
Meanwhile, he went behind the front desk and into the office, trashing everything.
He went back out into the gym, knocking over free weights, display walls, and huge weight machines. By this time, the police began arriving, with one of the first responders in being a woman. The enraged man spotted her and began going after her, so right as he went to approach her, she tased him.
She reports it then looked like the man had a heart attack. The Troy Record reports the man got treatment for cardiac arrest, and both the Record and the TU report he was later pronounced dead at Albany Med.
Update: Colonie police say the man was tased multiple times during the struggle -- apparently once when he triggered the taser himself. [TU] [Troy Record]
Noted: the stream of tweets from @Beau511 had been pared down.
Find It
Gold's Gym Latham
195 Troy Schenectady Rd
Latham, NY 12189
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Comments
How dedicated to your abs do you have to be to continue your ab work out when some guy is rampaging through the gym and the cops show up and taze him?
Or perhaps dedicated isn't the right word.
... said codemonkey on Oct 31, 2011 at 12:12 PM | link
I used to work out there in the AM when I lived on that side of town. Certainly a sad and bizarre occurance...
... said derryX on Oct 31, 2011 at 12:15 PM | link
Maybe his Muscle Milk was past the expiration date?
Too soon?
The easy guess is 'roid rage but I'm thinking either depression drugs or just drugs, period.
... said Save Pine Hills on Oct 31, 2011 at 12:31 PM | link
For someone who was "10ft away", how did her first post state that "9 police cars and 3 ambulances show up for a piece of equipment falling over on someone at the gym." Just curious...
... said Tim on Oct 31, 2011 at 1:29 PM | link
I know the man who died and all I can say is he will b missed by many. He was one of a kind I just can't imagine what caused him to flip out like what was reported and I'd love to know. RIP Brother
... said ill will on Oct 31, 2011 at 6:16 PM | link
This is a textbook case of Excited Delirium to me. They should have made an attempt to sedate this person early on. A spray of intranasal versed would do the trick.
... said Mike on Oct 31, 2011 at 8:33 PM | link
If the man was in a rage, and knocking over equipment, but not actually harming any person, maybe the female officer should have waited to enter the premises. Did anyone call 911 and say he did anything other than destroy property? Just wondering? If someone is in a rage and focused on inanimate objects, maybe the police officer could have waited for backup units before she entered. Sometimes people take all kinds of supplements prior to working out and it overstimulates them.
... said Myra on Oct 31, 2011 at 10:28 PM | link
He punched a guy in the face prior to flipping equipment and ripping things out of the walls... I'll be shocked if he wasn't having some sort of roid rage. With the information released at this time it does seem that the use of the taser fit what was going on.
What a weird, sad thing...
... said Casey on Nov 1, 2011 at 10:21 AM | link
Roid rage? Really? Could you be any more sensationalistic in your conjecture about the situation? ...You clearly don't know what you're talking about, and are just grappling with identifying the most simple and reductionist explanation for what's plainly a sad event.
People experience psychotic episodes, and while this young man have been violent *at this point in time*, it appears to be an isolated incident (that is, he didn't show any previous violent or psychotic behavior).
To echo another poster, it does sound like excited delerium. It's a pity that the tasers were deployed (though it sounds like a necessity to have done so); the stress of the shock in addition to the ongoing autonomic stress of the situation/episode, likely pushed him over the edge.
... said lionel on Nov 1, 2011 at 11:09 AM | link
How does the gym manage to stay open if he made such a mess? That does not seem right.
... said jen on Nov 1, 2011 at 1:15 PM | link
From the accounts of the situation, I can't imagine how anything could have been administered to this man intranasally. They couldn't even get him handcuffed.
Sad story all the way around.
... said Kerosena on Nov 1, 2011 at 5:59 PM | link
So he dies, they wheel him out, and that's that? Open for business? Unreal. Anyone who forks over money to those mega gyms is wasting their money to begin with, but this incident should tell you all you need to know about the Gold's Gym Corporation.
... said Jiminy on Nov 1, 2011 at 7:07 PM | link
@lionel are you saying roid rage is more urban legend than truth? Most peoples familiarity of these types of instances comes from stories like admitted steroid user bill romanowski
... said Daleyplanit on Nov 1, 2011 at 7:25 PM | link
re: "roid rage" comments
This isn't quite what roid rage is/how it works. It certainly seems like it could have been a substance of some sort, which would only be known by toxicology reports.
... said Kevin Marshall on Nov 2, 2011 at 3:04 PM | link