BOOTY WAS TO DIE FOR
Illegal injection kills mom
A Harlem woman was so obsessed with having the perfect Kim Kardashian-style booty that she got a black-market butt injection in a Manhattan apartment — and wound up dying from the botched procedure, police sources said on Monday.
Latesha Bynum (right), 31, was pumped with the toxic tush material in an unmarked building on East 21st Street near First Avenue in Gramercy Park on July 15, according to the sources and state health officials.
Twelve days later, the mother of two — who is shown flaunting her curves in a series of Facebook photos — was struck by an intense chest pain and dizziness, the sources said.
She called 911 at around 11 p.m. on Thursday and was rushed by ambulance to Mount Sinai St Luke’s hospital, where she was pronounced brain-dead and later taken off life support, according to the sources.
Cops spent much of last weekend investigating an apartment on the third story of the brick apartment complex, neighbor Michael Desouza said.
He was stunned that the upscale building had been used as a hub for back-alley plastic surgery.
“I know a few people in this building, and I can’t think of anyone that would do such a thing. Nice people in here,” Desouza said.
No legitimate medical professional works out of the Gramercy Park building, according to a spokeswoman for the state De- partment of Health.
“DOH has no record of a DOHlicensed facility at that location,” she said.
In recent years, women and transgender people have died after illegal “pumping parties” — in which they pay to have industrialgrade silicone injected into their breasts and rear ends to get curves at cut-rate costs.
In June 2015, Kelly Mayhew, 34, died in a Queens basement after a phony surgeon injected silicone into her backside and then bolted, police said at the time. The Maryland woman began gurgling and gasping for breath before EMTs arrived.
On Saturday, friends of Bynum posted a tribute video online, mourning her death and calling her a “sis to everyone who love[d] her.” The video notes her nickname was TeTe and features images of her posing with pals around the Big Apple.
Her Facebook page says she is married, formerly lived in The Bronx and would have had a birthday just two days after her death.
Police are investigating her death but declined on Monday to say whether anyone had been arrested. The procedure had been performed solely for “cosmetic purposes,” a police source said.
A woman in Apartment 3C, where a door had appeared to have been kicked in, declined to comment, saying, “I can’t talk about it.”
The apartment complex has no signs for medical offices, and residents said no businesses are located inside.