Unlucky Outside OTB: Bettor Falls Through Sidewalk Grating

A Tribeca resident should thank Lady Luck for suffering only minor injuries after falling 30 feet through a sidewalk grating on Murray Street on Saturday. According to a Chinese food deliveryman who witnessed the incident, Vincent Riggio, 59, exited the OTB parlor near Murray Street, "He had a cigar, he stepped on the platform and he fell. I looked down the hole. He was down there, squatting down. There was a lot of dust."

While others called 911, Riggio called his wife, who was vacationing at the Jersey Shore; Joann Riggio said, "He said he was bleeding and he possibly broke his ankle." She raced back to the city, to meet up with her husband at St. Vincent's Hospital. But Riggio escaped with few injuries; firefighters set up a pulley system to hoist Riggio out and Captain James Sheridan of the Ladder Company 1 explained, "He had cuts and bruises to his legs. He's a tough guy."

Riggio's fall was apparently broken by other platforms and/or surfaces on the way down. Joann Riggio reflected on her husband, "He enjoys the horses, that’s for sure," and as for his luck, "He always thinks he’s up. That’s the nature of gambling: you always hope to win." Earlier this year, dozens of children were injured when they fell through a sidewalk grating in Brooklyn.