Young man killed at 116th station

UPDATED 6:15 p.m

On Monday morning, a man was hit by a downtown 1 train at 116th Street, police officers on site confirmed. MTA workers and police officers say that it was likely a suicide, though the official cause of death is still being investigated. An NYPD detective, who requested anonymity, confirmed that the victim is not a Columbia student and that he was born in 1991, according to identification found on the victim's body. An investigator at the scene reported that the victim was a white male.

An official NYPD spokesperson said Monday afternoon that emergency medical technicians declared him dead at the scene, confirmed it was at 10:40 a.m., said he was an 18-year-old white male, and confirmed that he was not a Columbia student. A spokesperson later on Monday also said that though it was still an ongoing investigation and that release of the identity was still pending family notification as of 6:15 p.m., the investigators had ruled out any criminality in this case. No one had pushed the victim into the tracks.

An MTA supervisor who arrived on site at approximately 11:40 a.m. said that he saw the body was disfigured and that it was definitely a suicide. It was a front-end collision.

Officer Robert Reidy said that he also believes it was a suicide. He said he hadn't heard that it was a student, but there was no direct confirmation.

An MTA official said that it was definitely a suicide and that the man was dead on impact. "The body was mangled," the MTA official said.

Investigator Anthony Braxton from the MTA, who was investigating the scene after the 1 train resumed operations, said that the incident happened near the north end of the platform when the train first entered the station. After the young man jumped in, the train stopped, he said, but the victim died immediately.

NYPD officers and MTA employees tried to redirect passengers to alternative routes. They used a megaphone to announce that downtown service on the 1 train was suspended until 96th Street. Passengers described the scene as one of chaos and confusion.

"This has been a nightmare," Juliet Cameron, a local commuter, said. "These people [the NYPD and MTA] have been switching me to everywhere except where I want to go. They just stuck me on the number two train before, and I don't even know that area."

Officers were patrolling the platform of the closed-off downtown side.

Downtown service on on the 1 train resumed at approximately 12:50 p.m.

As of 1:45 p.m., spokespeople from the NYPD said that the case was "pending family notification," and until the family is notified, they cannot release the victim's name.

A University spokesperson said that Columbia could not yet comment on the situation.