WWE Employee’s Newborn Son Tragically Passes Away — Blames Hospital Negligence

WWE employee Cornell Gunter and his fiancé welcomed a child into the world, but that happy event was soon followed by unspeakable tragedy.

Gunter revealed that his son Cairo passed away while in the hospital. His story is awful and he told all with a series of tweets. This is a very horrible story to read and we must warn you that it could include some triggers. Our thoughts are with his family as they cope with this awful situation.

@orlandohealth tell CEO David Strong to come visit my son in the NICU. He’s fighting for his life since the nurses at Winnie Palmer Hospital showed negligence which led to my son being born with no heart beat & didn’t have oxygen for 8 mins which led to his current brain injury.

I’ve called him 3 times. Sending over the Vice President AINT it. I want DAVID STRONG to come see what his staff has done to my child. Your staff didn’t care to treat a black woman with the proper respect and LISTEN to her. Now we’re here praying for our child to SURVIVE. WELL his mother is trying to even recover for an emergency surgery one of your doctors thought it was wise to speak about pulling the plug on my child IN FRONT OF HIS MOTHER WHO DIDNT EVEN GET TO HOLD HER CHILD.

Advertising

Advertising

April 17th – we arrived at Winnie Palmer at 11:55pm est. We checked in at 12am. My fiancé told the clerk in the triage that our son hasn’t moved in 10 hours. He’s 40 weeks. He’s usually super active. But his movement has been decreasing and she had a discharge that meant

SOMETHING IS WRONG. The clerk in the triage had the nerve to tell my fiancé “I’ve been getting a lot of folks who’s babies aren’t moving lately” .. she completely disregarded her worries and fear that something is wrong. We then are told to sit and wait.. for 25 mins.

We go to back room in the triage around 12:26-12:30am The nurse asks what’s wrong, my fiancé “says our child hasn’t moved in 10 hours and My discharge is Meconium (when the baby poops in the wombs it can get into the child’s lungs and cause real issues).. the nurse said HOW DO

YOU KNOW ITS MECONIUM ?.. my fiancé said his sister who’s a well respected midwife has confirmed it and has been confirming stuff for us the whole 10 months. Hasn’t been wrong. However the nurse acts as if the information is false. Makes us wait 15 mins… then comes back in to Check my fiancé and realizes she’s in fact telling the truth. It’s Meconium. We again told her The baby is in distress. He needs to come out immediately. By this time it’s almost 2am.. she then leaves the room.. comes back and said we’re gonna give you a Covid test..

so she does the test.. then says oh lets monitor the baby… so they finally hook the monitor up.. we’re almost at 235am.. so they tried to see how far along our baby was dilated but it was difficult so they said let’s do an ultrasound. We’re like good because we can see what’s Going on. The nurse literally applies the gel to my fiancé’s stomach and put the reader on her then says okay well his head is down.. then cuts off the machine… so we’re sitting there like wtf. She then leaves the room… comes back in then says the baby is in distress we gotta Get you to labor and delivery.. we’re like Yes WE’VE SAID THIS ALREADY THANK YOU. We think we’re leaving immediately then we’re told we’d have to wait for a bed. We’re like ma’am the baby is under distress. We can’t wait. However we do. Time passes we finally go upstairs

We’re happy because we think he’s finally gonna come out and he’s gonna be okay. However things get the absolute worse. We go into LND (labor and deliver). The LND nurse was asked by my fiancé to move her IV to her hand or a different location because it was causing discomfort The nurse then blew two of her veins then tried to MOVE THE IV WHILE ITS INSIDE OF HER ARM. My fiancé expresses how much it HURTS. Nurse then says im gonna get someone else who can do it. Then 3 women walk in. 2 young and 1 older. One of the younger woman goes to adjust the IV Then says “I don’t like to do this in front of an audience” and the nurses all laughed… (MIND YOU THE REASON WE ARE UPSTAIRS IS TO DELIVER A BABY WHO IS UNDER STRESS AND NEEDS TO COME OUT.) so the older nurse says ill do it then boom it’s over. The anaesthesiologist arrives The ask my fiancé to sit up so they can put the epidural in. She’s struggling to move because she’s been diagnosed with SPD (Symphsis Pubis Dysfunction) which means who pelvic bone separated and it’s for her to do anything. Both the nurse and anesthesiologist asked what’s that?

So we have to explain the condition and severity to both of them. Epidural happens, boom we’re like okay HOW IS THE BABY? He’s fine the baby is okay. So then we had to wait to make sure the epidural worked properly and didn’t harm my fiancé or the baby. Nurse says all good. So I Literally take 10 steps to grab another blanket and before i made it far from the door I hear an alarm going off. Nicole asked me was that her’s I said nah it’s not coming from in there. So next thing you know doctors are running by me. I was like what’s going on. I turn around There’s 6 nurses in our room. I run back in, Nicole is scared and says I don’t know what’s going on. The nurses are literally barking at her likes a dog and clapping their hands demanding her to turn every which way quickly when she’s told she can’t move that quick of her

Condition. Then they start moving her themselves. Then two nurses start debating on how many cms she’s dilated. STILL NOBODY TOLD US WHAT WAS WRONG. So they’re flipping her and doing all that for 7-8 mins before Doctor James runs in. She then tries to see how far she’s dilated

She then says she can’t tell, Grabs a different baby monitor that goes inside of the vag area but they couldn’t get his heart beat (at that moment we found out what they were looking for) . Then Dr James tried the baby monitor that gives you the audio of the heart beat but the The SAME nurse who blew my fiancé’s veins was frozen in the moment and couldn’t connect the cords for so we could hear the audio to find the heart beat..it’s after 5am btw. So Dr James says ultrasound.. finally gets it & within a split second screams we gotta go NOW. So everyone Is RUNNING to the OR. The nurses are trying to get my fiancé out of the room to SURGERY but are running into the walls and couldn’t get her out of the room. So now we’re close to 5:20. Im told to wait in the LND room. So I’m beyond scared and freaked out. So a nurse finally And tells me dad come on! Im gonna take you in the OR. I said HOWS THE BABY? HOWS MY FIANCÉ? Nurse: they’re both fine, the baby is getting cleaned off. I was beyond relived.. I walk Into the OR and nicole is crying and she says “this can’t be happening” I told he’s okay the Nurse said he’s fine. She said NO HE HASNT CRIED YET SOMETHING IS WRONG GO CHECK ON HIM. As I turned around a doctor walked over and said “Cairo doesn’t have a heart beat.. im so sorry. We’re gonna keep trying” I just grabbed my fiancé as she cried so hard while still being in Middle of them finishing up her C Section. The doctor comes back and says we have a heart beat but Cairo went without oxygen to the brain for 8 mins. That’s a heavy blow and injury to the brain. But come see him. So I get up and walk over to my beautiful son on a table lifeless.

I broke down immediately. It hurt so bad, but the doctors said “take out your phone and take photos”. I was so hurt but I did it anyways and I don’t know why. I sat back down with my fiancé and we cried together. My son was then transported to the NICU where he currently is now

Sadly, Cornell sent out an update this morning to say that his son passed away. He blames Orlando Health for this tragedy, and it’s not hard to see why he would believe that. More could have certainly been done to assist them during this time of crisis.

This is a heartbreaking tragedy and Gunter has received a ton of support from his WWE family and others as well. Our thoughts are with Cornell Gunter and his entire family during this incredibly difficult time.