The father of a Russian man who died in a tragic ‘excited delirium’ incident aboard a JetBlue airplane at New York JFK on April 12, 2019, has failed in his bid to sue the Port Authority Police Department (PAPD) for wrongful death and the use of excessive force.
The incident occurred when Russian national Evgeniy Lagoda was traveling from his home in Moscow, Russia to Kingston, Jamaica, where he was to join the crew of a tanker ship to work as an engineer.
Lagoda, who was only 39 years old, was connecting through New York JFK after his first flight from Moscow, and after a lengthy nine-hour layover in JFK, he boarded JetBlue flight 659 to continue his journey to Jamaica.
As the plane pushed back from the gate and started to taxi for takeoff at around 10:00 pm, Lagoda suffered a seizure so severe that his entire body started to convulse and be began bleeding from the mouth.
Flight attendants and three off-duty nurses rushed to help, and Lagoda was carried into the galley at the back of the aircraft, where he was rolled onto his side and pillows were placed between his head and the floor so that he could “work through the seizure.”
After several minutes, the seizure stopped, and Lagoda began to come round. He was disoriented, sweating profusely, and struggling to get up.
He managed to get to his feet, and one of the nurses tried to explain to him what had happened. Without warning, Lagoda forcefully punched the nurse in the abdomen, sending her stumbling backwards into the cabin.
A flight attendant tried to intervene but was also struck five or six times in the chest. The pilots immediately taxiied back to the gate, while one of Lagoda’s Russian coworkers, who was also on the flight, tried in vain to calm him down.
A PAPD police officer rushed to the gate and was on the scene just as the plane was pulling up to the jetbridge. As soon as the main cabin door was opened, the officer boarded the airplane and was directed towards the back of the cabin.
The police officer found Lagoda standing in the galley with his hands still clenched in fists by his side. Eyewitnesses recounted how Lagoda lunged at the officer, causing him to draw his pepper spray from his belt and spray a burst at Lagoda.
The pepper spray had zero effect on Lagoda, and he simply wiped it away from his face before swinging at the officer.
In response, the officer struck Lagoda in the face and forced him to the ground in an attempt to handcuff him. A struggle ensued with the officer straddling Lagoda, who was face up at this point.
During the struggle, Lagoda managed to bite the officer’s leg through his trousers, and attempted to grab at his gun belt. Fearing that Lagoda was reaching for his service weapon, the officer punched Lagoda in the face while calling for help over the radio.
As he waited for help to arrive, the heavier Lagoda was beginning to push up. In response, the officer lay on top of Lagoda to stop him from moving.
A short time later, four other PAPD officers arrived at the aircraft and helped to restrain Lagoda. As each officer grabbed a different limb, Lagoda continued to resist. One passenger later told investigators that Lagoda was “like a wild animal.”
Once Lagoda was handcuffed, however, one of the officers noticed that his neck was turning blue. They checked for a pulse and realized that he wasn’t breathing. The officers immediately removed the handcuffs and started CPR, while a flight attendant rushed to get the onboard defibrillator and oxygen.
The defibrillator was connected to Lagoda’s chest, but no shock was advised because it did not detect any electrical signal.
At around 10:50 pm, EMTs arrived at the aircraft, delayed because they had been waiting for a police escort to the plane, and took over Lagoda’s care. They unsuccessfully attempted to use a defibrillator on Lagoda before transporting him to Jamaica Hospital, where he was pronounced dead at 11:35 pm.
An autopsy was carried out the following day, and the report concluded that Lagoda had suffered a Grand Mal Seizure, which was complicated by post-ictal Excited Delirium.
Common causes of a Grand Mal Seizure, now more commonly referred to as a clonic tonic seizure, include epilepsy, brain tumors, brain scarring, and even alcohol withdrawal. Sometimes, the cause is never fully established.
Following a clonic tonic seizure, the patient may be disoriented, confused, agitated, and act aggressively.
Excited delirium, meanwhile, is nowadays referred to as acute behavioral disturbance, and it results in someone acting way beyond the point of exhaustion, with superhuman strength, which can put an enormous toll on their heart.
ABD is considered extremely dangerous due to the fact that sufferers may fight to the point of heart failure, and, in this case, Lagoda was found to suffer from
hypertensive cardiovascular disease.
The following year, the New York State Attorney issued its final report into the incident, concluding that the officers involved in the restraint of Lagoda did not act unlawfully and that their use of restraint could not be proven to be unjustified beyond a reasonable doubt.
In 2021, Mr. Lagoda’s father filed a wrongful death lawsuit against the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, but after a lengthy legal battle, the Port Authority won to have the claim thrown out of court.
In a recently filed memorandum and order, US District Judge Naomi Buchwald concluded that Lagoda’s family had failed to prove that the officers used objectively unreasonable force against Lagoda, or that their use of force was a proximate cause of death.
And while the autopsy report did find that Lagoda suffered numerous ‘blunt force injuries,’ these were considered to be superficial and would not have resulted in the death of an otherwise healthy person.
In any case, the lawsuit would have failed because Lagoda’s family failed to file their suit within the 12 month time period for this type of case.
In the wake of the incident, the PAPD was advised to supplement its use-of-force training with guidance on individuals who have just suffered a seizure. The PAPD was also advised to start equipping its officers with body-worn video cameras.
