Gym Grunter Not Assaulted by Silencer, a Jury Rules
They are among the irritants who are an unfortunate part of the New York experience: the testosterone-laced grunters who practically cough up a parakeet with each biceps curl.
After the verdict Monday, Christopher Carter met Marybeth Roman, one of the jurors who cleared him of assault charges. For the suffering New Yorkers who have only dreamed of eliminating nuisances like these without having to be polite, Christopher Carter might be a hero.
On Monday, a jury acquitted Mr. Carter of assault charges for manhandling the stationary bike of a fellow gym member, Stuart Sugarman, who was shouting and grunting during a spin class. Even though Mr. Carter’s defense lawyer acknowledged in court that his client had grabbed Mr. Sugarman’s bike by the handlebars, tilted it back and then released it, with Mr. Sugarman astride, the jury decided that he was not a criminal for having done so.
After nearly 10 hours of deliberations, the six jurors agreed that they could not say beyond a reasonable doubt that Mr. Carter had caused the back and neck trouble that hospitalized Mr. Sugarman for nearly two weeks.
“Probably, most likely, but not definitely,” said one juror, Marybeth Roman.
It was hardly a landmark case. It will not be highlighted in lawbooks. But the verdict may provide many a New Yorker with the satisfaction of a “gotcha” moment.
The jurors who heard the case in Manhattan Criminal Court, several of whom were interviewed afterward, certainly did not seem to be on the side of Mr. Sugarman, who had described his grunts in testimony as “expelling air.”
“I was like, ‘Why must he be obnoxious and disrespectful to the others?’ ” said Ms. Roman, a 20-year-old sociology student who lives on the Lower East Side.
Ms. Roman said she and the other jurors questioned the credibility of Mr. Sugarman, who testified that he had suffered chronic neck and back pain.
The altercation occurred at an Equinox fitness club on the Upper East Side in August. Mr. Sugarman, a 49-year-old senior partner at an investment firm, was yelling things like “You go, girl!” and “Good burn!” in spin class, and Mr. Carter could not take it anymore. He twice asked the instructors to get Mr. Sugarman to quiet down, according to trial testimony. But after Mr. Sugarman continued, harsh words were exchanged.
Mr. Carter, 45, a stockbroker, stormed over to Mr. Sugarman’s bike and lifted it, crashing the back of it into a wall, witnesses said. Mr. Sugarman said the force of the bike dropping to the ground caused a herniated disc in his neck.
Although Mr. Carter was not proud of his actions, according to his lawyer, Michael C. Farkas, he maintained that he did not cause Mr. Sugarman’s injury. The verdict, Mr. Farkas said, proves what he and his client have been saying all along: Mr. Sugarman is not believable.
“If you’re going to act in a manner that’s going to be completely inconsiderate of others, then great things aren’t going to happen for you,” Mr. Farkas said outside court.
Mr. Carter, who was not claiming the mantle of everyday New York hero, was relieved to leave court a free man.
“I had some long nights over the last nine and a half months,” he said.
But the ordeal is hardly over.
Samuel L. Davis, a New Jersey lawyer representing Mr. Sugarman, said his client planned to file a lawsuit Tuesday against Mr. Carter and Equinox. He said he hoped that New Yorkers would not view the verdict as a call to arms of sorts.
“I don’t know if there’s going to be an uprising, but the short-term message is sometimes you can get away with assaulting somebody who’s annoying,” he said.
Indeed, some of the annoyed sat on the jury.
“I probably would’ve helped Carter with telling the instructors, ‘Look, this guy, he’s being a nuisance,’ ” Ms. Roman said.
B. J. Tormon, a 21-year-old nursing student whose thick biceps indicate that he has spent some time working out, said confrontations in exercise class were common. “Stuff like that happens in the gym,” he said.
Even Brigid Harrington, the assistant district attorney prosecuting the case, painted a less-than-sympathetic portrait of Mr. Sugarman.
In her closing arguments on Friday, she told the jurors that Mr. Sugarman was probably not someone “you would want to hang out with regularly.” But that should not matter, she said.
“I don’t want you to think that Stuart Sugarman had it coming,” Ms. Harrington said. “We know that society and the law does not work that way.”
