FortBendNow.com

An off-duty Houston police officer may have been involved in a disturbance outside a Stafford club that claimed the life of a man early Saturday.

Syulvanus Okhueleigbe, 30, was pronounced dead at Southwest Memorial Hospital shortly after 2 a.m., according to information released Monday by the Stafford Police Department.

The Stafford department received a 911 call at 1:56 a.m. Saturday, “reporting a disturbance in the parking lot of a local establishment known as Studio 59, located at 11110 W. Airport,” the department said in a statement. “The caller stated a Houston Police Department officer had detained a person and requested an officer.”

Stafford police officers arrived at the scene and found a man, later identified as Okhueleigbe, lying unconscious in the parking lot. Members of the Stafford Fire Department arrived and administered first aid until emergency workers from the Fort Bend County Emergency Medical Services arrived and transported Okhueleigbe to the hospital, the Stafford department said.

Officials with the Stafford department and the Fort Bend County District Attorney’s Office said they could not comment on the cause of Okhueleigbe’s death.

However, a source close to the investigation said preliminary results from an examination of Okhueleigbe’s body indicate “manual asphyxiation” was the cause of death – choking – and the man’s hyoid bone, located in the neck below the chin, may have been broken.

Witnesses to the incident outside the club were taken to the Stafford department for questioning, however, little information about what transpired prior to Okhueleigbe’s death was released. A department spokesman said more information may be released later this afternoon.

The Houston police officer apparently in the parking lot during the incident was identified as Thomas Harris, a 15-year police veteran assigned to Houston’s West Side Substation. A source with knowledge of the case said Harris was believed to have been off-duty at the time of the incident, and may have been “a patron” in Studio 59, but was not working there.

Fort Bend County District Attorney John Healey said Monday that Stafford is conducting an investigation into Okhueleigbe’s death, and no charges have been filed pending preliminary investigation results. Healey’s office will assist in the investigation, in “gathering up some items” from the Harris County Medical Examiner’s Office and the Houston Police Department.

Because Okhueleigbe was transported to a Houston hospital, his body was taken to the Harris County medical examiner after his death. Healey said his office and Stafford detectives are awaiting the examiner’s report.

A Houston Police Department spokesman could not immediately be reached for comment, but Healey said the department will conduct an internal investigation into the incident.