Kelly Mayhew, a 34-year-old Maryland woman, was having silicone injected into her buttocks to enlarge them Saturday, her mother told police, when she became short of breath, was rushed to a nearby hospital and died, the New York Daily News reports.
Mayhew, a freelancer for BET Networks, was having the cosmetic procedure administered in the basement of a Queens, N.Y., home by a woman posing as a credentialed plastic surgeon, the Daily News explains. When the woman injected silicone into Mayhew’s butt, Mayhew began “gurgling” and experiencing difficulty breathing. Mayhew’s mother, who had driven with her to the location, tried to administer CPR on her daughter and asked the woman who had given her the injection to call 911, the Daily News reports.
Instead, the woman ran out of the house, got into a gray SUV and fled, sources told the Daily News. Mayhew was taken to a local hospital, where she died. Mayhew’s sister described her shock on Facebook.
“Too soon only 34 years old, mah [sic] heart can’t believe it,” Mayhew’s sister Cece wrote.
Jamie Owens, a BET representative, expressed the network’s condolences. “Our heart goes out to her family and we extend our deepest sympathies for their loss,” Owens said.
Mayhew and her mother drove from Maryland to Queens so that Mayhew could have the procedure. Her mother told police that Mayhew had had five previous butt-enhancement procedures before Saturday’s fatal incident. Authorities were looking for the unidentified woman who injected Mayhew.
Read more at the New York Daily News.