The Familiar Suicide and Final Wish of the N.Y.C. Gunman
Shane Tamura is not the first former football player to shoot himself in the chest and request that his brain be examined.
By Juliet MacurJohn Branch and Ken Belson
July 29, 2025, 5:42 p.m. ET
The scenario has become grimly familiar to football fans: A former player experiencing cognitive issues kills himself with a gunshot to his chest, rather than his head, to allow for his brain to be examined for the disease linked to repeated blows sustained on the field.
Dave Duerson, the Chicago Bears great, took his life that way in 2011, and Junior Seau, a Hall of Fame linebacker, did the same a year later. Even a teenager in Missouri, Wyatt Bramwell, killed himself that way in 2019, after recording a sober farewell to his family. He requested that his father donate his brain to researchers.
“I would like that to be done,” Mr. Bramwell said into the camera in a video shared with The New York Times by his parents. “I want you all to be happy that I’m free and that I can rest easy, because my life for the past four years has been a living hell inside of my head. I love you. And goodbye.”
The shooter in Midtown Manhattan on Monday was the latest former football player to choose this fate, though only after more carnage. The gunman, Shane Tamura, shot himself in the chest after killing four others. The police said Mr. Tamura, who played high school football in California, carried a note that referred to chronic traumatic encephalopathy, or C.T.E., the degenerative brain disease that has been linked to repeated blows to the head in contact sports.
“Study my brain please,” the note said.
Mr. Duerson, Mr. Seau and Mr. Bramwell were found to have C.T.E., which can be diagnosed only posthumously.
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The risk of developing C.T.E. was long considered limited to those who toiled for years in professional football or boxing, sustaining an untold number of blows to the head. But more recently it has been diagnosed in much younger athletes in a range of contact sports, including those who never played professionally — or, in some cases, did not even play in college.
In a Boston University study released in 2023, researchers examined 152 brains of contact-sport athletes who died before turning 30 and whose families had concerns about brain disease. Of the 152 athletes studied, more than 40 percent had evidence of C.T.E. Most played at no higher than the high school or college levels. Of the 63 who died with C.T.E., 48 played football.
The disease has garnered national attention in cases involving violent crime. Aaron Hernandez and Phillip Adams, both former N.F.L. players, murdered people and died by suicide. In 2012, Jovan Belcher, the former Kansas City Chiefs linebacker, killed his girlfriend before killing himself.
Mr. Nowinski said there were similar cases that had not yet been made public. A handful of former athletes — including football players — murdered people, killed themselves and later were found to have C.T.E., he said.
It is unclear if Mr. Tamura played college football or had a contract with a professional team. But even someone who played only at the high school level and never sustained a concussion could have C.T.E., Dr. McKee said, because repeated hits to the head — including those less severe than a concussion — can cause the disease.
Mr. Tamura’s mental state in recent months is unknown. Investigators are likely trying to piece together how long he planned Monday’s attack. And the medical examiner’s assessment of his brain will reveal whether he did in fact have C.T.E.
His last wish for a brain examination was similar to the request made in a note by Mr. Duerson before he died, and the video by Mr. Bramwell, the 18-year-old.
“Hello. So what this is, this is me explaining what’s wrong with me,” Mr. Bramwell said. “Um, I’ve been depressed for a long time. My head is pretty messed up and damaged. The voices and demons in my head just started to take over everything I wanted to do.
“I took a lot of hits through football, a lot of hits through football. I took a lot of concussions. And a lot of times I never told anybody about how I was feeling in my head after a hit. You know, I just kind of kept playing, which was not smart on my end. I know that.”
In a text message to The Times on Tuesday, Mr. Bramwell’s parents, Bill and Christie Bramwell, said they were “extremely saddened by the tragic loss of life,” and that the decision to let a child play football is an individual one for each family.
“With our loss of Wyatt, our new role is to inform that football injuries involve more than just broken bones. They are the unseen injuries that later show and sometimes with a devastating loss,” they said in the text message. “Continue the conversation.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/07/29/us/n ... lence.html
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