A 54-year-old man died after allegedly bursting out of the freezer of an Upper West Side restaurant and brandishing a knife at an employee on Sunday morning. He reportedly screamed,"Away from me, Satan!" before he died.
The incident took place around 11 a.m., at 423 Amsterdam Avenue. Employees at Sarabeth's, a popular brunch destination, managed to wrestle the man to the ground. "Police said once the man hit the ground, he suffered an undetermined medical condition," according to PIX11.
The man was taken to St. Luke's Roosevelt Hospital where he was pronounced deceased.
It's unclear how the man got into the freezer. A waiter at a neighboring restaurant told the Daily News, "I asked them, ‘Are you OK?’ I thought they were busy. The place is always busy. They told me, ‘No, someone tried to attack in the kitchen.’ "
Another neighborhood resident wondered how the man got into the restaurant, "If they were there overnight, well obviously you can't be there in freezer overnight, but if somebody had broken in it's not like you would see them at 11 for the first time or around that time. You would have done that way earlier because you have to prepare the food."
The Medical Examiner's office will investigate the cause of death. According to West Side Rag, police sources say, "He is from Arizona. Police don’t know when he went into the freezer, why he is in NYC, if he’s a tourist or not."
