Coworkers of dead NYC fitness trainer Jacob Zieben-Hood long suspected abuse

Fitness trainer and social media influencer Jacob Zieben-Hood, who bled to death in the bathroom of his Harlem apartment from stab wounds to his leg, was frequently seen with black eyes and a bruised nose at the Manhattan gym where he worked in the months leading up to his tragic death, multiple long-time colleagues of the victim told the Daily News.

Zieben-Hood always had an explanation for the marks on his face and arms, blaming his injuries on bad falls and street fights when questioned by his co-workers.

But as pathologists with the city’s chief medical examiner’s office work to determine how the stab wounds that Jacob Zieben-Hood suffered were inflicted, his co-workers said they believe their late colleague hid a years-long pattern of abuse at the hands of his husband as he struggled to project the image of a perfect life.

“It’s one of those crimes, where you might not know this person well, but when you read about it and you look at this picture-perfect relationship, always together, always holding hands, just ‘love is in the air,’ and then you just realize it’s [all made up],” said 33-year-old Irina Caisin, manager at the CompleteBody gym where Jacob Zieben-Hood worked.

“It’s not the happy relationship they’re trying to portray.”

Police discovered the fitness instructor’s lifeless body in the bathroom of his W. 138th St. apartment near Frederick Douglass Blvd. around 4 a.m. on Aug. 1, after his husband, Donald Zieben-Hood, told 911 operators that Jacob had attacked him, prosecutors with the Manhattan’s DA’s office said.

Donald had three cuts requiring stitches on his arms, while officers found his husband “slumped over on the floor covered in blood with gashes from his head and multiple stab wounds to the back of his leg, including a stabbing on the back of his calf that penetrated his muscle,” prosecutors said.

Police said they believe Jacob suffered a severed artery from one of his leg wounds that caused him to bleed to death. Multiple knives were recovered from the apartment.

A spokeswoman for the city medical examiner’s office said pathologists were awaiting “additional investigative information” before determining a cause of death. Manhattan prosecutors said earlier in the week that Jacob’s death was being investigated as a homicide.

Jacob called his father prior to his death, and the worried dad overheard Donald shouting vile insults at his son, said prosecutors. During the call, Jacob told his father that his husband was wielding a knife and refused to let him leave the apartment, prosecutors said.

Jacob texted his father a picture of his wounded leg from the apartment’s bathroom, said prosecutors. His husband would not call 911 until almost nine hours later, cops said.

Prosecutors said an order of protection had barred Donald from being in the apartment or having any contact with Jacob after at least two violent attacks in the past six months. It was among Donald’s first concerns when speaking to authorities, police said.

“I have an order of protection placed against me,” Donald told a dispatcher during the 911 call. “I’m totally getting arrested, right?”

News of the court orders of protection barring Donald from contacting Jacob came as a revelation to Jacob’s longtime co-workers, who only learned of the abuse he’d suffered after it was too late, Caisin said.

“I read about the restraining order and I was in a glare, because we told him to go to the police, I never knew if he actually did,” the gym manager said. “If we knew that he had a restraining order, Donald would never be allowed in here.”

Caisin described Donald as “a jealous person” and said he spent long hours at the gym where his husband worked, watching over Jacob as he met with clients and interacted with other trainers. The supervision Donald maintained over his husband struck Jacob’s coworkers as bizarre, Caisin said.

“At one point, I don’t know what happened to Jacob, but Jacob started to come almost every day with Donald,” said Caisin. “Which was weird for us because Donald is not employed by the company, he’s not paid by the company, and he was here all day long.”

Donald once asked Caisin to confront another trainer he accused of flirting with his husband, according to the gym manager, who said his meddling created rifts between Jacob and other gym employees.

“It got to the point where [Donald would say], ‘I want you to talk to that trainer because I think he likes my husband.’ It’s like, ‘No Don, that’s how people interact. There are other people beside you,’” Caisin told The News.

It was in the months preceding Jacob’s tragic death that coworkers began noticing bruises and black eyes on the beloved trainer, which Jacob explained away with stories that didn’t square with the Instagram model’s beauty-conscious demeanor, said Caisin.

“He said once he fell down and he got into a fight. I’m like, ‘Yeah, you don’t look like the fighting type.’ Like, he had perfect cheek bones and concealer. You don’t seem to be the guy who gets into fights,” Caisin said.

Jacob worked at the gym as a fitness instructor for Systimfit, a personal training service that outfits clients with suits that stimulate muscles with electric impulses as they exercise. Joining the company in 2017, Jacob earned a reputation has a quick learner and hard worker, who provided the talent necessary to help the company weather the COVID-19 shutdown, his former boss told The News.

“I watched him progress to the point where he could take [a novice trainer] under his wing. And so, because I travel so much, he was the one holding it down for us. He was the glue for our company,” said 44-year-old Josh Holland, co-founder of Systimfit.

Like Caisin, Holland said he and other Systimfit trainers noticed Jacob appearing bruised and battered at work, but that he always managed to ward off suspicion.

“All of us who have worked with him, anyone that was ever around throughout time, we all saw marks on him and things like that. He’d have black eyes and bruises, things like that, but there was always an excuse for it. And all the justifications made sense,” said Holland. “They were very savvy about it.”

And as a person who had everything going for him, Jacob didn’t seem the type to suffer at the hands of an abusive husband, said Holland.

“Smart, astute guy. Fit. I would never think that he was getting assaulted,” Holland said.

Donald was arrested earlier this year for two assaults against his husband in the Harlem apartment — one at 11:30 p.m. Feb. 26, and the other early the next day. He was accused of choking Jacob and then two hours later choking him again and hitting him in the face.

Jacob almost lost consciousness in the earlier incident and suffered swelling, pain and cuts to his face in the second assault, prosecutors say.

Donald was hit with a slew of charges including assault, strangulation, harassment, criminal obstruction of breathing and contempt of court in that case and was freed on $20,000 bail.

At about 7:05 p.m. on June 14, Donald allegedly confronted Jacob outside their Harlem home with a knife and said, “I will attack you,” according to a criminal complaint. He was charged with menacing and contempt of court and released on $5,000 bail. Donald is due back in court Aug. 28 for those cases.

Following Jacob’s death, a Manhattan Criminal Court judge ordered Donald held without bail following his arrest for burglary, criminal weapons possession and aggravated criminal contempt for violating the order of protection.

With Thomas Tracy