The body of an unidentified 45-year-old man was recovered from an artificial lake outside of SoFi Stadium on Wednesday after firefighter and dive teams responded to reports of a person jumping into the water. According to a report by the Los Angeles Times, the man entered SoFi Stadium's parking lot at 6:01 a.m. local time before entering the water and advancing towards the middle of the lake.
Stadium security called police shortly after the man entered the facility, and the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department's Special Enforcement Bureau and L.A. County firefighters were also called to the scene shortly afterwards. Two security officers went to the lake where the man was spotted, but by that time the man was already in the water.
His body was recovered at 9:48 a.m.
Inglewood mayor James Butts said Wednesday afternoon that the man had not been identified and that the stadium did not know why he was on the property or entered the water.
"Honestly, this is someone who made a conscious decision to trespass on the property, get into the lake, and he ended up having some distress and difficulty," Butts said. "So I don't think there's anything that SoFi could have done to prevent this."
The drowning death of the man in question continues a streak of deaths that have accompanied the construction and opening of SoFi Stadium, the home of the NFL's Los Angeles Rams and Los Angeles Chargers. Multiple deaths occurred during construction of the stadium in 2020, with one worker falling to his death from the stadium roof and another dying of "cocaine intoxication" and heat exhaustion.
Shortly after the opening of the stadium, a man believed to be homeless was found dead with a stab wound to his neck on stadium grounds. A fourth death occurred in December of 2020 when a construction worker was killed in an accident at the retail district that was being built adjacent to the stadium.
