According to her agent, Helen Brann, the noted author and poet died near her home in Winston-Salem, North Carolina early this morning.
“She’d been very frail and had heart problems, but she was going strong, finishing a new book,” Brann told ABC News. “I spoke to her yesterday. She was fine, as she always was. Her spirit was indomitable.”
Calm down folks, Jennifer Lopez is still alive and kicking. But for some strange reason, the hash tag #RIPJenniferLopez is trending.
While Obamacare is saving millions of lives today, there are still some states – headed by Republican governors – that insist on killing their citizens… literally. One of those states is Florida and the case of Charlene Dill is a sad but perfect example.
Dill, a 32-year-old mother of three, collapsed and died on a stranger’s floor at the end of March. She was at an appointment to try to sell a vacuum cleaner, one of the three part-time jobs that she worked to try to make ends meet for her family. Her death was a result of a documented heart condition — and it could have been prevented.
Dill was uninsured, and she went years without the care she needed to address her chronic conditions because she couldn’t afford it.
Under the health reform law, which seeks to expand coverage to millions of low-income Americans, Dill wasn’t supposed to lack insurance. She was supposed to have access to a public health plan through the law’s expansion of the Medicaid program. But Dill, a Florida resident, is one of the millions of Americans living in a state that has refused to accept Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion after the Supreme Court ruled this provision to be optional. Those low-income people have been left in a coverage gap, making too much income to qualify for a public Medicaid plan but too little income to qualify for the federal subsidies to buy a plan on Obamacare’s private exchanges.
Florida has one of the highest uninsurance rates in the nation, and is home to a disproportionately large number of residents who struggle to afford health services. Nonetheless, lawmakers have continued to resist accepting generous federal funds to expand Medicaid to an estimated 750,000 low-income Floridians like Dill.
Nobody batted an eyelid. Bills were paid. And life went on as normal in the quiet neighborhood of Pontiac, Michigan.
Neighbors didn’t notice anything unusual. The woman traveled a lot, they said, and kept to herself. One of them mowed her grass to keep things looking tidy.
At some point, her bank account ran dry. The bills stopped being paid.
After its warnings went unanswered, the bank holding the mortgage foreclosed on the house, a common occurrence in a region hit hard by economic woes.
Still, nobody noticed what had happened inside the house. Nobody wondered out loud what had become of the owner.
Not until this week, when a worker sent by the bank to repair a hole in the roof made a grisly discovery.
The woman’s mummified body was sitting in the backseat of her car, parked in the garage. The key was halfway in the ignition.
Authorities say they believe the woman died at least six years ago. They’re still trying to figure out what happened.
“I’ve been doing this 37 years. Never seen anything like this before,” said Undersheriff Mike McCabe of Oakland County, Michigan, just outside Detroit.
Rarely heard from
The woman, who authorities aren’t identifying until they’ve informed her family, paid her bills from her bank account through auto-pay, according to McCabe.
Neighbors said they didn’t know much about the dead woman, describing her as in her 40s and of German descent.
“She really kept to herself. We never really heard anything from her,” neighbor Caitlyn Talbot told CNN affiliate WXYZ.
Talbot said she wasn’t aware of anyone having seen the woman, who traveled a lot, in about six years.
“She was probably there for a couple of days, then she’d leave for a week, then she’d come back. Then she’d leave for a month and come back,” Talbot said.
McCabe says neighbors chalked up the woman’s absences to her returning to Germany for long periods of time.
Despite years without a living owner, the house was never broken into, he said.
Authorities told WXYZ that the house appears to have black mold inside it, and that detectives entered the building Thursday wearing hazardous material suits.
Another neighbor, Darryl Tillery, told the Detroit Free Press that mail never piled up at the house and the lawn never grew out of order. McCabe said one of the neighbors cut the grass for years.
Cause of death undetermined
Police were dispatched to the house for a welfare check in 2007 after a neighbor reported not having seen the owner in a while. After seeing no signs of anything amiss, police went on their way, McCabe said.
Authorities are still waiting for a toxicology report, which will take four to six weeks, before determining the cause of death. The medical examiner found no signs of trauma to the body, McCabe said.
Dr. Bernardino Pacris, the county deputy medical examiner who conducted the autopsy, told the Detroit Free Press that the woman’s skin was still intact, but that the internal organs had decomposed.
Pacris told the newspaper that during the mummification process, skin develops a parchment-like consistency and leathery texture. Finding a body in such a condition is unusual, he said, but “once in a while, we see this.”
Attempts by CNN to reach Dr. Pacris late Thursday were unsuccessful.
h/t – cnn
A 4-year-old girl is dead following a shooting at her home in Lake Worth.
Palm Beach County Sheriff’s officials say the girl was flown to Delray Medical Center, where she died Thursday night.
Authorities haven’t identified the child, or her parents. The shooting happened around 5:30 p.m.
A neighbor told the Palm Beach Post the young couple moved into the home less than a year ago and she often saw the man playing with the little girl.
Shirley Temple, the dimpled, curly-haired child star who sang, danced, sobbed and grinned her way into the hearts of Depression-era moviegoers, has died, according to publicist Cheryl Kagan. She was 85.
Temple, known in private life as Shirley Temple Black, died Monday night at about 11 p.m. at her home near San Francisco. She was surrounded by family members and caregivers, Kagan said.
“We salute her for a life of remarkable achievements as an actor, as a diplomat, and most importantly as our beloved mother, grandmother, great-grandmother, and adored wife for fifty-five years of the late and much missed Charles Alden Black,” a family statement said.
A talented and ultra-adorable entertainer, Shirley Temple was America’s top box-office draw from 1935 to 1938, a record no other child star has come near. She beat out such grown-ups as Clark Gable, Bing Crosby, Robert Taylor, Gary Cooper and Joan Crawford.
In 1999, the American Film Institute ranking of the top 50 screen legends ranked Temple at No. 18 among the 25 actresses. She appeared in scores of movies and kept children singing “On the Good Ship Lollipop” for generations.
Temple was credited with helping save 20th Century Fox from bankruptcy with films such as “Curly Top” and “The Littlest Rebel.” She even had a drink named after her, an appropriately sweet and innocent cocktail of ginger ale and grenadine, topped with a maraschino cherry.
Temple blossomed into a pretty young woman, but audiences lost interest, and she retired from films at 21. She raised a family and later became active in politics and held several diplomatic posts in Republican administrations, including ambassador to Czechoslovakia during the historic collapse of communism in 1989.
“I have one piece of advice for those of you who want to receive the lifetime achievement award. Start early,” she quipped in 2006 as she was honored by the Screen Actors Guild.
But she also said that evening that her greatest roles were as wife, mother and grandmother. “There’s nothing like real love. Nothing.” Her husband of more than 50 years, Charles Black, had died just a few months earlier.
They lived for many years in the San Francisco suburb of Woodside.
The NYPD reportedly found 70 bags of heroin labeled “Ace of Spades” or “Ace of Heart” in the apartment of Philip Seymour Hoffman, who was discovered dead of a drug overdose yesterday morning. Police have launched a citywide hunt for Hoffman’s drug dealer.
“An internal email went out to all supervisors asking if anyone has had any experience with those brand names of drugs,” a law enforcement source told The New York Post. “They’re going to try to find the source.”
Using something called a “nitro dump,” police hope to narrow down the dealer’s location. From the Post:
“Basically what that is, is any time we make a narcotics arrest we include the brand name on the arrest report and store it in our system so our investigators can see where those brands are being sold,” the source explained.
Once they determine a location, they can zero in on the dealer or dealers selling that particular brand.
Oscar-winning actor Philip Seymour Hoffman was found dead of an apparent drug overdose inside a Greenwich Village home on Sunday, cops said.
Hoffman’s body was found by a friend at 11:30 a.m. Sunday morning in an apartment at 35 Bethune St., sources said.
Cops are at the scene and are investigating, sources said.
Hoffman has admittedly struggled with drug addiction in the past, and reportedly checked himself into rehab last year for heroin abuse.
h/t – nypost
Eric Lawson, who portrayed the rugged Marlboro man in cigarette ads during the late 1970s, has died. He was 72.
Lawson died on 10 January at his home in San Luis Obispo of respiratory failure due to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, his wife, Susan Lawson, said on Sunday.
Lawson was an actor with bit parts on such TV shows as Baretta and The Streets of San Francisco when he was hired to appear in print Marlboro ads from 1978 to 1981. His other credits include Charlie’s Angels, Dynasty and Baywatch. His wife said injuries sustained on the set of a western film ended his career in 1997.
A smoker since age 14, Lawson later appeared in an anti-smoking commercial that parodied the Marlboro man and an Entertainment Tonight segment to discuss the negative effects of smoking. Ms Lawson said her husband was proud of the interview, even though he was smoking at the time and continued the habit until he was diagnosed with COPD.
“He knew the cigarettes had a hold on him,” she said. “He knew, yet he still couldn’t stop.”
A few actors and models who appeared in adverts for Marlboro cigarettes have died of smoking-related diseases. They include David Millar, who died of emphysema in 1987, and David McLean, who died of lung cancer in 1995.
Lawson is also survived by six children, 18 grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren.
NEW YORK (AP) — Longtime conservative radio host Bob Grant, whose combative style became the template for broadcasters such as Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh, has died at age 84.
Grant’s death on Tuesday in Hillsborough, N.J., after a short illness was confirmed on Thursday by New York radio station WABC, which once fired him over his acid-tongued remarks about the plane crash death of one of President Bill Clinton’s cabinet members, the first black commerce secretary.
“Remember this: If you are offended during the next two hours, it’s nobody’s fault but mine,” Grant said at the top of a broadcast featured in a 2010 tribute. “Because somebody’s got to say these things. It has to be me.”
Grant was born Robert Ciro Gigante in Chicago in 1929. He began his broadcasting career in the 1940s at WBBM in Chicago. He moved on to radio and television jobs in Los Angeles and was named afternoon drive time host at WABC in 1984.
Over the years, Grant, who was white, offended some listeners by referring to former New York Mayor David Dinkins, who’s black, as a “washroom attendant,” calling Clinton a “sleazebag” and suggesting women on welfare should be sterilized.
An East St. Louis woman who was found stabbed to death in her apartment Saturday night had posted a Facebook status update prior to her murder warning her friends that she might die.
“If anything happens to me tonight just let my kids know I loved them dearly and tell my momma I love her,” Michelle Rowling posted on November 25th.
Less than a week later, police were called to Rowling’s housing complex to investigate a disturbance and found the 25-year-old bleeding out, having sustained several stab wounds.
She was rushed to a nearby hospital, but was pronounced DOA.
According to the St. Clair County State’s Attorney Brendan Kelly, Rowling’s post was in reference to the release of her ex-boyfriend, 25-year-old Montrell Cooper, who had been jailed since August for assaulting her.
Cooper, who is the chief suspect in Rowling’s murder, had assaulted Rowling before, but she testified on his behalf and managed to get his sentence reduced to probation.
The accident occurred in Santa Clarita — outside of Los Angeles — when Walker’s Porsche apparently lost control and crashed into a tree, TMZ reported. The car burst into flames and exploded.
One witness at the scene told The Santa Clarita Valley Signal, a local newspaper, that he tried to put the fire out and recognised Walker inside the vehicle.
“Him and his buddy, his brother in arms at heart just decided to joyride, take a spin. Something we all do. We’re all car enthusiasts. … We’re all here driving, enjoying each other, and God must’ve needed help,” said Antonio Holmes.
“We all heard from our location (the accident). It’s a little difficult to know what it was. Someone called it in and said it was a vehicle fire.
“We all ran around and jumped in cars and grabbed fire extinguishers and immediately went to the vehicle. It was engulfed in flames. There was nothing. They were trapped. Employees, friends of the shop. We tried. We tried. We went through fire extinguishers.”
WWalker had one child – daughter Meadow Rain, 15, with ex-girlfriend Rebecca McBrain.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/lifestyle/celebrity/paul-walker-fast-and-the-furious-star-dies-in-car-crash-20131201-2yj4e.html#ixzz2mCOFZhKhh/t NY Daily News
