Unanswered questions about the death of the ABC producer after he choked while drunk outside a New York restaurant

Unanswered questions remain about the sudden death of a high-flying ABC producer who choked outside a New York City restaurant while enjoying dinner with his wife while their children were left alone in a hotel room.

Dax Tejera, 37, drowned while drunk while he and his wife, Veronica, 33, dined at Bobby Van’s on Park Avenue on December 23 while their daughters, then aged 6 months and 2 years, stayed at his room with the members. -Yale Club only.

But some of the circumstances surrounding the incident remain unclear, including who the couple was with at the restaurant and the discrepancy between initial statements that Tejera suffered a heart attack and the official cause of death.

Police investigating the neglected children discovered that “friends” of the couple had come to the hotel to check on them after Tejera collapsed, but it is not known who the friends were.

Veronica, meanwhile, received a desk ticket ordering her to appear in court, though the NYPD on Wednesday declined to give an update on the case or the status of charges.

Tejera with colleagues from ABC in a meeting with President Biden and First Lady Jill Biden. The NYPD called ABC’s New York office the night of Tejera’s death and informed his colleagues.

Tejera’s devastated colleagues learned of his death after the New York police called the station’s New York office later that night.

Police responding to the incident shortly after 9:00 p.m. on December 23 called the New York office of ABC News and informed a manager that Tejera, producer of This Week with George Stephanopoulos, had died. It is also unclear why the NYPD decided to contact Tejera’s employer so soon after his death or if his wife had asked them to.

Tejera had worked at ABC since 2017, when he started as a senior producer in the network’s Washington DC office.

Less than two hours after Tejera collapsed, officers received a 911 call around 11 p.m. about the children the couple had left alone at the members-only Yale Club at 50 Vanderbilt Avenue, a block from the restaurant.

Hotel staff discovered that the children had been “left unattended for at least two hours” while the Tejeras ate dinner. It is unclear who the Tejeras were with at dinner. After Tejera collapsed, police discovered that ‘friends of the couple [had gone] to the hotel to pick up the children’.

Verónica Tejera, who had traveled in an ambulance with her husband to Bellevue Hospital in New York, was arrested around 12:20 p.m. She was later charged with two counts of “acting in a manner injurious to a child”.

The children stayed with their grandparents, while Veronica was issued a desk ticket, ordering her to appear in court at a later date, and was released shortly after 4 a.m.

A spokesperson for Veronica was contacted for comment.

Witnesses who saw Tejera collapse appear to have initially believed that he was having a heart attack or cardiac arrest.

The FDNY said that emergency medical units responded to a “report of a person in cardiac arrest” at 9:16 p.m.

Dax and Veronica Tejera left their children alone in their Yale Club room for at least two hours while they ate dinner at Bobby Van’s. Veronica was arrested by the police for ‘acting in a way harmful to a child’

The couple left their daughters alone for at least two hours while they enjoyed dinner at Bobby Van’s Steakhouse at 230 Park Avenue in Manhattan, a block from the Yale Club. In the photo on the left: the entrance to the grill. Pictured to the right: Dax and Veronica in 2018

The next day, ABC News president Kim Godwin told staff in a memo that Tejera had “died suddenly of a heart attack.”

The New York City Office of the Chief Medical Examiner said Wednesday that Tejera died after he choked on poisoning. The official cause was ‘asphyxia due to obstruction of the airways by a food bolus complicating acute alcohol poisoning’.

A Bobby Van’s staff member has claimed that Tejera seemed unwell “before no one ate” and that just after a server brought the orders to the table, he asked Tejera, “Are you okay, sir?”

Tejera then got up and started walking as if he were going to the men’s room, but he turned right and walked out the front door, and the server followed him outside.

Dax Tejera, pictured with his children and his wife Veronica, died on December 23 after choking on a Manhattan steakhouse. Veronica was arrested after it emerged the couple had left their daughters, then 2 years and 5 months old, alone in a Yale Club hotel room.

“The server said he collapsed in the corner, right here outside the restaurant,” the employee told the New York Post.

Veronica admitted after the incident that it was a “bad decision” to leave the couple’s daughters alone. She said they were monitoring the children using a camera.

Veronica’s LinkedIn profile recently listed her as a Senior Producer at the Washington Post, which she joined in October 2022. Prior to that, she spent nearly six years at CNN. Her profile indicates that her accomplishments there include producing an interview with President Joe Biden on The Lead with Jake Tapper.

She launched a fundraiser for the Tejera children’s college account 529 after her husband’s death. The page read: ‘Dax Tejera passed away suddenly, leaving 2-year-old Sofía and 6-month-old Ella without her father. Please support the girl’s education.’

Tejera had worked at ABC since 2017, when he started as a senior producer in the network’s Washington DC office.

He previously worked at NBC and earned degrees from Dartmouth and Columbia.