Najai Turpin, 23, known as ‘Nitro’ on NBC’s coming ‘The Contender’ boxing themed reality series, killed himself in front of his girlfriend early Valentine’s Day morning. The Philadelphia Daily News reported that Turpin was in his Chevrolet Lumina with his girlfriend when he took his own life at approximately 4AM. Turpin’s trainer, Perry Custus, had been scheduled to pick him up at the home of his girlfriend later that morning, and noted “he had a lot of stuff on his mind. I was going to talk to him about it while we were driving to camp. You never really knew what was going on in Najai’s head.” Aside from being survived by his girlfriend and young daughter, Turpin also left behind the brother, sister, niece, and nephew he had been responsible for since the death of his mother five years ago. He had stated his reasons for partaking in ‘The Contender’ were to provide a better life for this family.
Turpin had been publicly critical of the fact that ‘The Contender’ had continuously been delayed, mostly due to the fact that contractually he was not allowed to fight again until the conclusion of the May 24th finale of the program. He had previously held a 13-1 record with 9 KOs and was not happy with his time off, finding himself 20 pounds over his fighting weight at the time of his death. Turpin is the second known reality suicide, the first being Sinisa Savija, 34, and the first eliminated castaway on the first ‘Expedition: Robinson’. The show would later be brought to North America by Mark Burnett as ‘Survivor’. Savija threw himself before a train only weeks after his elimination, and like Turpin, prior to the airing of his program. Burnett has stated there will be no changes or edits made to ‘The Contender’.