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A NEW Jersey restaurateur who shot to prominence as celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay's target in the Kitchen Nightmares reality show, has committed suicide in the Hudson River, officials said.
Joseph Cerniglia, the 39-year-old owner of an Italian eatery called Campania, was seen by viewers in the 2007 episode of Kitchen Nightmares being berated by Ramsay for sloppy service and poor food.
He admitted on air to being close to bankruptcy, as Ramsay, a volatile and foul-mouthed British chef, warned him that the business was 'about to swim down the Hudson'.
Last Friday, Cerniglia's body was found in the river, apparently after he leapt from the towering George Washington Bridge that connects New York City to New Jersey.
"It was a suicide. He died from drowning and blunt impact. He jumped from a height," a New York Medical Examiner's office spokesman said.
Cerniglia was the second former star in one of Ramsay's shows to commit suicide, the New York Post reported. Chef Rachel Brown, 41, took part in the Hell's Kitchen series in 2006 and shot herself in Texas.
Cerniglia's family posted a message of thanks to well-wishers on his Facebook page and asked 'that in lieu of flowers a financial donation be made to Joe's family to help provide for Joe's wife Melissa and their three sons'.
