An Arlington Heights man described by friends as a fan of metal music has died weeks after he said he disappeared on the final day of the Riot Fest festival at Douglass Park in North Lawndale only to be found injured the next day at a hospital of the region.
Friends and family found Stephen Shult, 58, at Stroger Hospital, two miles from the festival, the day after friends and family lost track of him on September 22. He suffered head injuries that his friends and family suspect were due to violent action. On Thursday, Shult died at West Side Hospital.
“We don’t have a first-person view of what actually happened, but based on all the scrapes and bruises on his arms and legs and the brain injury, the most common thing that we all concluded was that he must have been stomped on,” his longtime friend Brian Soto told the Tribune.
But an autopsy performed Saturday was inconclusive, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office. It would take several weeks for a final decision to be made on the cause and manner of Shult’s death.
Shult’s wife and daughters declined to comment when contacted by phone. A GoFundMe created by one of his daughters had raised $5,739 as of Saturday afternoon. In the update message announcing Shult’s death, his family said his condition deteriorated after initial signs of recovery.
Shult’s friend Soto, 38, who accompanied him to the festival, told the Tribune that Shult was with him before the concert and did not disappear until after the concert began.
A resident of the west suburbs, Shult was a big fan of metal music, particularly the bands Dio, Metallica, Mastodon and Rob Zombie. “The two things he always did (were) listen to metal music and watch the cooking channel on mute,” Soto said.
Shult had been particularly excited to see the band Slayer, so Soto, who had been attending the festival for several years, invited him to use the free tickets he had won. They attended the festival on Saturday and spent most of Sunday camping near the Metro stage. Soto said they agreed to meet at the festival’s Ferris wheel in case they got separated.
That Sunday night, Soto said Shult left the area where they were seated right after Slayer started playing, wanting to get closer to the stage. His daughter noticed just after he left that he had forgotten his phone, so they went to find him at the Ferris wheel as mentioned previously. “He never showed up,” Soto said.
The family reported Shult missing to police and later discovered through a festival employee’s Facebook post that he had been taken to Stroger Hospital, Soto said. At the hospital, Soto said he found Shult “in bad shape.”
A Chicago police spokesperson said they were notified of the death Friday and that officers “responded to Stroger regarding the death of a 58-year-old man who suffered a head injury.” Police called the case a “non-criminal death.”
In a social media post Friday, Riot Fest organizers offered their condolences to Shult’s family, saying he suffered a medical incident before Slayer’s performance. Festival organizers also refuted online speculation that Shult may have been injured by moshing, a sometimes violent form of dancing at metal concerts sometimes called slam dancing.
“We are aware of the various speculation surrounding this tragedy, including claims that it may be linked to the Slayer mob,” the post read. “However, we would like to clarify that this is not the case.”
Soto said it was “frustrating” to see Riot Fest’s post that Shult was injured before the performance at the Ferris wheel.
Funeral arrangements for Shult were pending.
