A manager at a Philadelphia-area Planet Fitness allegedly refused to allow good Samaritans to use the gym’s defibrillator on a man who suffered a heart attack outside, a lawsuit says.
Guy Harris, 46, died Jan. 22 after going into cardiac arrest near a Planet Fitness in Clifton Heights, Pennsylvania, according to the wrongful death suit filed by his wife Wednesday in the Philadelphia Court of Common Pleas.
A married father of two, Harris had been driving his 11-year-old son to get a snack after school when he started experiencing symptoms of a heart attack, prompting him to pull over, the legal complaint said. He parked a short distance from the entrance to the Planet Fitness, where he was a member, it said.
Harris’ son got out of the car, called 911 and pleaded for help from passersby, said the lawsuit, which was first reported by NBC News. The legal filing said that one bystander who worked in the medical field began CPR on Harris, while another told customers exiting Planet Fitness to go back inside to ask for the gym’s automated external defibrillator, or AED — a portable device that delivers an electric shock to try to restore a person’s heartbeat.
“Two Planet Fitness patrons returned to the club and requested the AED, indicating that a man was dying outside,” the lawsuit read. “Despite knowing about the life-or-death situation unfolding, the Planet Fitness club manager refused.”
The lawsuit names Planet Fitness Inc., which is headquartered in New Hampshire, and Keystone NFP Clifton LLC, the franchisee operator in Clifton Heights, as defendants. Neither immediately responded to NBC News’ requests for comment.
Harris’ wife, Taniqua Morene-Harris, declined to comment. An attorney for her said that the couple had been married for nearly 21 years and that Harris died the day before their son turned 12.
“They’re all just shocked by this whole occurrence and how it happened,” said Elizabeth Crawford, a partner at the Philadelphia-based law firm Kline & Specter, PC. “AEDs save lives — but only if they’re used.”
It’s not clear from the lawsuit why the Planet Fitness manager, who is not identified or named as a defendant, allegedly refused to allow the use of the AED. The suit said bystanders continued to try to resuscitate Harris using CPR, but he was pronounced dead later that day after an ambulance rushed him to the hospital.
The lawsuit accuses Planet Fitness and its franchisee operator of negligence that led to Harris’ “extreme pain and suffering and untimely death.” It seeks a jury trial and unspecified damages.
Planet Fitness has more than 2,700 clubs throughout the world, its website says.
Crawford called what happened at the Clifton Heights location a “deliberate decision to withhold life-saving measures.” She said the fact that Harris’ cardiac event happened outside the gym was no excuse for denying access to an AED.
“It’s reasonable to assume that someone could have a heart attack outside the facility just as much as they could have it in the facility,” she said.