A crush of people trying to get inside a college gymnasium on Saturday for a charity basketball game led by rap music artists left eight dead and at least 28 injured, police said.
Six victims apparently were trampled or smothered to death in the stampede at City College in Harlem, police Capt. Daniel Carlin said. Two others died later at a hospital.The event was billed as the Heavy D and Puff Daddy Celebrity Charity basketball game. Heavy D and Puff Daddy are rap stars and each captained a team. The disturbance began before the game started.
Charrisse Miles, 21, said a line of ticketholders had been let inside the gym. Another group of people without tickets began pushing against the doors, swarming into the foyer of the gym.
"The crowd was pushing up against the doors and the walls trying to get in," Miles said, adding that she saw about 20 people passed out on the floor.
An announcement was made over the public address system saying the game would not be held because three people had died outside, she said.
At that point, people also began running out. She said she stayed in her seat to avoid being caught in the crowd.
"They were just rushing in." said Tanya Smith, who watched from across the gym. "There wasn't enough security and not enough space."
Miles said the event was sold out and heard there were about 2,500 ticketholders.
Kay Morgan, 19, a student at Temple University in Philadelphia, described the foyer where the crush occurred as a "bottleneck."
"There was just a lot of people coming to get in," Morgan said. "A lot of people didn't even realize that there were people on the floor."
Carlin said downstairs doors leading into the gym was closed, but people kept trying to get in, pushing from behind to create the fatal crush.
One of the dead was a 25-year-old man, who died of severe internal injuries at St. Luke's-Roosevelt Hospital, spokesman Phyllis Goodman said.
A woman, 21, was in critical condition on a respirator, a 16-year-old boy was in stable condition with a head injury and a 14-year-old girl was having trouble breathing, she said.
A handbill listed the rappers participating as Heavy D, of Heavy D and the Boyz; Mike Bivins, of Bell Biv Devoe; members of Run-DMC and Puff Daddy.