Spectators not allowed to attend home basketball games

Spectators are not allowed to attend home basketball games for the rest of the season at a middle school in northern Vermont after a brawl broke out and one of the participants died, school officials said Thursday. “We recognize that the vast majority of spectators at our events support and model the values of teamwork, collaboration, sportsmanship, health and well-being in student activities. However, we can not ignore the increase in spectator misconduct at school sporting events throughout Vermont, including in our gymnasiums,” Grand Isle Supervisory Union administrators said in a statement. State troopers were called to the Alburgh Community Education Center on Tuesday night after a report of a large fight involving spectators during a seventh- and eighth-grade boys basketball game between Alburgh and St. Albans. The fight ended before troopers arrived, and many of the participants had left. Russell Giroux, 60, of Alburgh was taken by ambulance to the Northwestern Medical Center in St. Albans, where he was pronounced dead. The state police and Grand Isle state’s attorney’s office are investigating Giroux’s death. An autopsy was done, but the cause and manner of death are listed as pending further investigation, including toxicology testing and ongoing work by investigators, police said.