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Former WTVJ anchor Joel Connable has passed away at the age of 39. Connable co-anchored WTVJ nightly newscasts for a brief time in 2008 and 2009, and had married his longtime girlfriend Angela Shlyakhov, a Miami paralegal, just two weeks ago. Connable suffered from diabetes throughout his life and died as a result of a diabetic seizure.
Connable’s time in Miami was brief. He was selected to take over at WTVJ for 23-year-veteran Tony Segreto and was honored with our Best of Miami award for Best TV News Anchor. He was fired in 2009. WTVJ claimed he accepted a free stay at a luxury resort in St. Thomas, a journalistic no-no, but Connable maintained the station was just looking for an excuse to cut costs and cut him. He quickly filed a still-unresolved lawsuit against the company. He recently made his return to local news, anchoring weekend broadcasts for KOMO in Seattle.
SFLTV reports that according to a message posted on his Facebook page by his sister, Connable always wore a diabetic pump. The pump malfunctioned, which Connable did not notice, and he ended up suffering a seizure.
“He called in sick Monday, saying he was very, very sorry but he had caught a bad bug,” KOMO news director Holly Gauntt told Gossip Extra. “When he didn’t show up for work late Tuesday, we called police and asked them to do a welfare check. Joel was found on the floor in his new apartment.”
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