Christopher Gilbert near drowning: Louisiana family seek justice after aspiring medical student left brain dead after friends insist they didn’t know he couldn’t swim, despite video showing failing to save him.
It was suppose to be a harmless prank, (or was it?) but it nearly cost him his life … never mind the long road to recovery ahead as a family now demand those allegedly responsible be held accountable.
An aspiring medical student was left brain dead when his ‘friends’ pushed him into a Louisiana lake last month knowing he couldn’t swim — and then looked on while doing nothing to save the drowning man, KSLA reported
Video (see below) shows the ‘group of friends’ casually peering into the water moments after shoving Christopher Gilbert off the dock at Lake D’Arbonne in Farmerville on April 14.
Why didn’t friends attempt to save student underwater for 10 minutes?
At least one woman can be seen slowly entering the water before abandoning the rescue mission.
It was another 10 minutes before a patron at a nearby restaurant intervened and brought Gilbert back to land — with little time to spare. Gilbert was recovered in approximately 15 feet of water according to KSLA.
The 26-year-old was brain dead and the rest of his organs were starting to fail by the time he arrived at a local hospital, his mother Yolanda George who has since filed a personal injury lawsuit told the outlet.
He spent 72 hours on a ventilator and an ECMO machine, which George described as ‘dialysis for the lungs.’
‘I was devastated. I felt like my life had ended in that moment. My son is aspiring to be a medical doctor, my son is going to be a medical doctor. He got his masters last year in biological science. He’s preparing for medical school so for this to have happened to him … I was just devastated,’ George said.
‘Why did they push my son knowing he couldn’t swim?’
The group of friends initially told police he ‘just kind of fell face first into the water’ before one of the members of the group admitted that she had shoved him off the pier as ‘horse-play.’
Explained George, ‘A friend of his called and she was hysterical crying. She told me that Chris has fell into the lake and he had been underwater for 10 minutes or so.’
It was only later that a female around the same age as Gilbert admitted to pushing him into the lake.
None of the friends, however, stated knowing Gilbert couldn’t swim — a claim the man’s family finds hard to believe.
‘Why would you push my son in the lake knowing he couldn’t swim?’ demanded George.
‘To add insult to injury, after pushing him, no one from the ‘friend group’ attempted to go in after him. Instead, two brave bystanders, who have no relationship to Chris, heard commotion and retrieved his body from the lake,’ stated personal injury attorney Claudia Payne, representing the man’s family, according to the Lincoln Parish Journal.
Was it criminal intent?
‘In the legal field, we characterize things the way we see fit,’ added Payne. ‘Of course, they are saying horseplay. We are saying that it was a criminal intentional push into the lake.’
Fortunately, Gilbert has made strides since the incident.
He is responding cognitively, but cannot speak, according to George. He still relies on life support and his lungs are said to be at 20% capacity.
The family is also demanding that an arrest be made in the tragic incident, with Payne saying the friends displayed criminal intent by pushing him into the lake.
An incident report by Sgt Ashley Rhodes of the Union Parish Sheriff’s Office stated that the friends believed, ‘Gilbert was playing a prank by not coming up immediately.’
Adding, ‘Some members of the group did not realize Gilbert could not swim.’
Gilbert remains on life-support in hospital as doctors try to establish whether he will ever recover.
‘It’s still a battle because we don’t know what to expect,’ his mother said.
‘We don’t know if it may turn worse again because at one point, he was off the ventilator but then they put him back on two days later.’
Along with pursuing a personal injury lawsuit against the group, Gilbert’s family hopes to pressure investigators to make an arrest. To date no charges have been filed.
