Daughter of leading investment banker, 29, is found dead bleeding from throat in NYC apartment stairwell after 'she tripped on her heels'

Carlisle Brigham, 29, found bleeding in stairwell of Lower East Side building in New York City

Discovered around 11 a.m on Monday dressed all in white and lying in a pool of blood on the floor

Police initially thought the extent of her wounds indicated she had been murdered

Investigators ruled that she was the victim of a tragic accident



She was the daughter of City's former budget director

Was staying in building with male roommate and was reportedly estranged from her husband, who was in London on business at time of death



A young woman from a wealthy New York family was found dead yesterday at the bottom of a treacherously steep Manhattan stairwell - possibly after tripping on her high heels following a night out to celebrate a friends wedding.



Discovered dressed all in white lying in a pool of blood just before 11 a.m., Carlisle Brigham, 29, had suffered a massive wound to her neck, a shattered chin and compound fractures to her arms which made investigators initially believe she had been murdered.

However, the New York City Chief Medical examiner ruled that Ms Brigham, whose father is former New York City Budget Director James Brigham, died in a tragic 'freak accident' in the Lower East Side after suffering blunt trauma to her head and neck.



Tragic: Carlisle Brigham (with unidentified friends) died after a fall down stairs in a New York apartment building shortly before she was to meet her father for lunch

Declaring the death to be accidental, a spokesman for the medical examiner said that Ms Brigham did not bleed to death and her injuries were consistent with a heavy blow to her head and neck.



'She was wearing all white,' said resident Lippy Khair, 27, 'White top, white pants. And she had really high heels.'



One resident of 191 Orchard St. said that he attempted to perform CPR on Brigham but unfortunately she was already dead when he found her.

'Her body was actually quite cold,' said 19-year-old Mizanur Rahman.



'The whole floor was just blood.'



The former mayor of New York, Ed Koch, for whom James Brigham worked said that her grief-stricken father called him yesterday.



'He was sobbing,' said Koch to the New York Post.

'He told me that she had died and that it was apparently a fall...a freak accident.



'Wonderful young woman.



'I just was overwhelmed with grief and still am.'

Before their estrangement: Carlisle Brigham and Anthony Champalimaud pose together. Ms Brigham died after what appears to be a tragic accident on the stairwell of the Manhattan apartment she was staying at

Turmoil: Ms Brigham married her husband Anthony Champalimaud (right) last year but the couple was said to be estranged and he is thought to have been in London on business at the time of her death

Carlisle Brigham was reportedly estranged from her husband of one year and living in the Lower East Side apartment building with another man at the time of her death.

Her father, James Brigham Jr., served as the New York City budget officer in the late 1970s before moving to St. Louis and turning to private equity at Warson Capital Partners in St. Louis.

Ms Brigham married Anthony Lindley Champalimaud last August, though the Wall Street Journal reports that she was no longer living with him at the time of her death.

Mr Champalimaud works for a hotel design firm run by his mother and The New York Daily News reports that he was in London on business when Ms Brigham was found.



Mr Champalimaud is the vice president of YLT Hotels and Properties and has a leading role in the operations at the five-star Gainsborough Hotel in Bath, England.



A law enforcement official told the Journal that Ms Brigham was staying with a male roommate in an apartment in 191 Orchard Street, and she was found bleeding on the second floor landing of the building.



The roommate told police that the last time he heard from Ms Brigham was shortly before her death, when she called him at work and 'sounded distraught'.

Though neighbors performed CPR on her body, she was transported to Beth Israel Medical Center before being declared dead.

'I knew something had gone seriously wrong when I flipped her over,' neighbor Mizanur Rahman told The Daily News.



Police in front of 191 Orchard Street, investigating the death of Carlisle Brigham, 29, the daughter of a leading investment banker, after she was found with her throat sliced open in the stairwell



The stairwell in Orchard Street in Manhattan's Lower East Side where Carlisle Brigham died

Scene: Ms Brigham was staying at 191 Orchard Street - slippery stairs and a heavy bag may have contributed to her fall

Distraught: The unidentified roommate who was living with Ms Brigham in the Lower East Side apartment building said that he got a phone call from the 29-year-old Monday morning and she 'sounded distraught'



'There was blood in nose, there was blood coming out of the mouth and a huge gash on her chin.'

The Local East Village blog of The New York Times reports that an unnamed resident of the building found her and spoke to police extensively after they arrived on the scene.



'She did not look like she was homeless or a hooker,' the resident, who is also a medic, told The Local East Village reporter.



Mystery: The city's medical examiner is investigating the nature of her fatal injuries

'She had too many accouterments of the average American young person in her 20s: An iPhone and wallet full of plastic.



'She had compound fractures in her arm and she was cut.'



The statement from New York Police Department spokesman Paul Browne to The New York Times appears to dismiss initial claims that she was stabbed, as he said that she 'struck her chin in a fall down a flight of marble stairs'.

Her death was confirmed by former Mayor Ed Koch, who worked with her father James Brigham Jr. from 1978 to 1981.



'He called me to tell me. He was sobbing. I broke down and cried,' Mr Koch said of how he was informed by Mr Brigham.

'They are wonderful people. She was absolutely extraordinarily beautiful. It just shook me as if I were kicked by a horse. It’s just awful,' Mr Koch told The Daily News.

Ms Brigham worked as an exhibit installation specialist at the American Museum of Natural History from 2007 to April of this year, and graduated from University of Mary Washington.