No additional charges in casino security guard death | Local News

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Falls police will not be filing an additional charges in the death of a Seneca Niagara Resort & Casino security guard.

The guard died from a heart attack following a domestic incident in the casino on May 6. But investigators say they can't tie his death to his encounter with a man who was charged with punching a woman and resisting casino security officers.

"There wasn't enough evidence to tie his heart attack to the earlier incident involving a woman and man in the casino," Falls Police Criminal Investigation Division Detective Capt. Kelly Rizzo said this past week.

Police were called to the casino around 2:40 a.m. for a report of a man punching a woman inside a nightclub there. When they arrived, casino security guards had the suspect detained on the gaming floor. 

A 30-year-old Falls woman told officers that she met a man on a dating website two days earlier and had agreed to meet him at a casino bar. The woman said she met a man she thought was the same person she had met online and hung out with him for about 45 minutes.

After leaving the man, later identified as Quynshod R. Johnson-Taylor, the woman said he began repeatedly calling her cell phone The woman said she returned to the bar and Johnson-Taylor became angry when she would not let him drive her home. 

After the woman told Johnson-Taylor to "leave her alone," the suspect "punched her in the throat, causing her to fall to the ground."

Casino security guards, including Thomas Dardes, arrived and attempted to detain Johnson-Taylor. 

Rizzo said Criminal Investigation Division detectives were able to review video from casino security cameras that showed the entire incident before police arrived. 

"You can see the guard (Dardes) grab (Johnson-Taylor), whose wearing a jacket and (Johnson-Taylor) manages to slip loose from him," Rizzo said. 

Johnson-Taylor led a group of security guards on a short chase on the casino gaming floor, but got caught up in some crowd control ropes and fell to the ground. The security guards then fell on top of him, but Rizzo said Dardes' involvement in the scuffle and the chase was incidental.

Police took Johnson-Taylor, 23, 3562 Ferry Ave., into custody and charged him with third-degree menacing and second-degree harassment. 

Roughy half an hour after leaving the casino, police were called back for a report of a security guard going into cardiac arrest. 

When they arrived they were told that after Johnson-Taylor's arrest, Dardes appeared to be pale and out of breath. Video shows Dardes "out of breath and trying to loosen his shirt collar" after the chase with Johnson-Taylor. 

The security guard was rushed to Niagara Falls Memorial Medical Center where he was pronounced dead.

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