(CelebNMusic247-News) MasterChef Runner Up Commits Suicide
MasterChef season 3 runner up, Josh Marks, was found dead Friday night in Chicago in an apparent suicide.
Josh Marks, the “Seven-Foot Chef” best known from season 3 of the reality cooking series “MasterChef,” was found dead Friday night in Chicago in an apparent suicide.
Here’s the drop:
Police responded to a call in the city’s Longwood Manor neighborhood around 6:45 p.m. Friday reporting a body in the alley. Marks, just 26, was found laying “face-up, unresponsive and bleeding from the head,” the Tribune reports.
The South Side resident was pronounced dead on the scene from an apparent self-inflicted gunshot wound according the medical examiner‘s office. A revolver was found near his body.
The self-taught chef was ordered to undergo a mental health assessment in August to determine if he was mentally fit to stand trial after he was accused of attacking a cop at the University of Chicago. In August it was also revealed that Josh was bipolar and was to undergo an assessment, but never did.
Police say the 7-foot-2 Marks allegedly “took the officer to the ground” when approached by police questioning him over visible injuries to his face according to DNAinfo Chicago. Marks struggled with officers and tried to take one of their guns before he was ultimately arrested.
Friday night, Chicago-based MasterChef judge Graham Elliot tweeted his condolences:
My heart goes out to the family of #MasterChef finalist Josh Marks, who passed away today. Please send thoughts/prayers their way! RETWEET
— GRAHAM ELLIOT (@grahamelliot) October 12, 2013
Months before his arrest, Marks revealed his own difficulties with mental illness in a video for the “Make a Sound Project, “an organization dedicated to helping people struggling with suicidal thoughts.
After news of the arrest, however, the LA Times notes several sponsors — including “Make A Sound” — coldly dropped Marks and distanced themselves from the troubled star.
Our prayers go out to Josh Marks family and friends…life should never be so hard you have to take your life…we are truly saddened by the news. Josh was our favorite Chef on the show and thought he had major promise.
