Rafu Wire and Staff Reports
SOUTH SAN FRANCISCO — A local man has been arrested for a fatal beating that took place at a gym in full view of customers.
On Sept. 17 at about 9:30 p.m., the South San Francisco police and fire departments responded to Bally Total Fitness on the 100 block of El Camino Real on a report of an assault. Upon arrival, investigators learned a gym member had been attacked by another gym member, later identified as 46-year-old South San Francisco resident Kenneth Osako.
According to witnesses and evidence, Osako used a solid steel bar, normally used to lift weights, to strike the victim on his head several times. After the assault, Osako dropped the steel bar and left the scene.
Paramedics provided medical attention to the victim and transported him to San Francisco General Hospital, where he died the next day from his injuries. The victim was identified as Diego Galindo, 43, of San Bruno, who was a butcher at Carniceria Tepa in South San Francisco.
Both Galindo and Osako were regulars at the gym. Police were trying to determine whether they knew each other.
Osako, a plumber, was located the next morning at a job site on Kansas Street in San Francisco and arrested by a team of officers from the South San Francisco Police Department and a special agent from the Department of Homeland Security. Police have not explained why Homeland Security was involved.
Osako was booked in the San Mateo County Jail for murder and is being held without bail. It wasn’t immediately clear whether he had an attorney.
Kealani Osako, one of the suspect’s five daughters, apologized to the Galindo family in an interview with KTVU-TV. “I know he’s sorry and I know he didn’t want this to happen,” she said.
She told KTVU that her father — who had planned to take her to UC Santa Barbara, where she starts classes this week — suffers from bipolar disorder, severe depression and anger issues, including blackouts. “Especially in the gym, that’s the worst time to get my dad angry, because when he’s in the gym, he takes it very seriously. Totally zones out.”
The two were arguing over a woman, Osako said. “The man was trying to get my father’s girlfriend to leave with him and that didn’t go well with my father, obviously.”
The suspect’s father, Kenneth Osako Sr., described his son as a good kid in an interview with NBC Bay Area.
But when asked if he would support his son regardless of the outcome, he replied, “No, if he’s guilty, he’s guilty. I don’t support anybody that’s wrong.”