Palermo Has Damage to the Nerve Controlling Movement in a Leg

American League umpire Steve Palermo, recovering from a gunshot wound in the back suffered while helping two robbery victims, is experiencing “some degree of leg immobility,” his doctor said Thursday.

Palermo was operated on Sunday, and the AL office said earlier in the week there was no indication he was suffering any paralysis.

But in a statement late Thursday, the American League office in New York said that diagnostic studies “have now confirmed that injury to the nerve controlling his leg function did occur, and that some degree of leg immobility exists at this time.”

The statement, which a league spokesman said was based on a conversation with Palermo’s doctor, added that rehabilitation “will be started next week, but neither the length of the rehabilitation period nor the degree of recovery can be predicted at this time.”

Parkland hospital officials said Palermo was listed in fair condition Thursday. Palermo’s wife, Debbie, answered the telephone Thursday night in his hospital room.

“The league released a statement, and right now we have no comment. That statement speaks for us,” she told Associated Press.

Palermo, who worked as third base umpire at the game in Arlington Saturday night between the Angels and Texas Rangers, was shot outside a restaurant in Dallas while coming to the aid of two waitresses.

Palermo ran outside about 1:30 a.m. Sunday along with restaurant owner Corky Campisi and former Southern Methodist University defensive tackle Terence Mann when a bartender saw four men trying to rob two waitresses at a Taco Bell near Campisi’s.

They caught one of the would-be robbers, but the three others fled. However, they returned and shot Palermo and Mann, officials said.