Connor Murphy, who amassed millions of followers across YouTube and other social media platforms, died Tuesday evening after jumping into a lake at a housing estate in Samut Prakan province, according to local news reports.
The 32-year-old arrived by vehicle outside the estate in Bang Phli district before the incident, Pol. Col. Veeraphong Roobsuay, deputy superintendent of investigations at Bang Phli Police Station, told local media.
Authorities also said Murphy allegedly vandalized the luxury home he had been renting before the incident.
Murphy was born in Michigan and raised in Arkansas. In an interview with creator Jesse James West, he said he moved to Texas to attend Southwestern University in Georgetown, where he launched his fitness and bodybuilding content his junior year.
He became known online for public fitness stunts and prank-style videos. The Megaphone, a Southwestern University student publication, reported in 2017 that his content included filming on a Chipotle roof and atop Walmart shelving. He told West one of his early viral videos occurred at Katy Mills mall in Katy, Texas, where he pretended to model in an Abercrombie store and police responded to the scene. That incident resulted in a five-year ban from the mall, according to The Megaphone.
In 2017, the University of Texas Police Department issued him a criminal trespass warning after authorities said he repeatedly entered Gregory Gymnasium without authorization to film YouTube videos, according to reporting from the student newspaper. An incident report says Murphy also recorded videos around campus, including near the UT Tower and along Guadalupe Street.
More recently, his content featured “day in the life of looksmaxxing” and adult-adjacent content, with what is reportedly his final video, entitled “RIP Elon Muscular.”
As news of his reported death spread Wednesday, fans filled Murphy’s social media posts with tributes, asking whether reports were true and leaving heart and dove emojis.
Nyle Nayga, a College Station native and Murphy’s former high school roommate, described him in a Facebook tribute as “heavily misunderstood by a lot of people.”
“Connor was a genuine person at heart. He was heavily bullied, as was I, through our childhood. Even in high school, before either of us started social media, all we wanted to do was create something of ourselves; unbeknownst to those who doubted us, those who [expletive] with us,” Nayga wrote in a tribute on Facebook. “Bonding over our upbringing and finding ourselves thru the gym — while not really having others close to go to.”
Nayga said Murphy inspired many men through fitness and said people often failed to recognize the mental and emotional pressures he faced.
Although the two had grown apart over the past five years, Nayga wrote they always knew they were “a DM or text away if needed.”