deaths still shrouded in mystery

Prince joined the grim fraternity of mysterious Hollywood deaths on Thursday, forever remembered not just for his musical achievements but for the puzzling questions hanging over his tragic end.

Prosecutors in his home county announced Thursday that no one would be charged in connection with his April 21, 2016, death because they could find no evidence to explain how he got the opioid that killed him in an accidental overdose.

A two-year investigation concluded that Prince thought he was taking the common painkiller Vicodin when, unbeknownst to him, it was laced with deadly fentanyl. But authorities could not say how Prince obtained the pills that killed him.  

Although scores of celebrity deaths have shocked and grieved millions over the years, only a relative few remain officially murky as to the who, what and why. Here are a few:

Bobbi Kristina Brown, 2015

The little-girl-lost daughter of the late, legendary Whitney Houston died July 26, 2015, in an Atlanta-area hospice nearly six months after she was found unconscious in her Georgia home. She was 22. She never regained consciousness to explain what happened before she was found face down and unresponsive in her bathtub in suburban Atlanta.

More than a year later, the autopsy results were released: She died from a fatal combination of multiple drugs and immersion in water. But the medical examiner could not say whether her death was intentional or accidental so it was ruled "undetermined." Although her family cast suspicion on her boyfriend at the time, no one has been charged in connection with her death

Dolores O'Riordan, 2018

The lead singer of the Irish alt-rock band The Cranberries died unexpectedly at age 46 on Jan. 15, 2018, in a hotel room in London where she was recording. Her death has been classified as "unexplained" but not suspicious. 

The coroner has yet to rule on the official cause of death.

Tupac Shakur, 1996

The star hip-hop artist was in a car headed to a club gig in Las Vegas when he was shot four times on Sept. 7, 1996, in a drive-by shooting. He died six days later, on Sept. 13, at a local hospital. He was 25. 

His murder is still unsolved.

Christopher Wallace, aka Notorious B.I.G., aka Biggie Smalls, 1997

Just six months after Shakur's murder, another star rapper, Wallace, was shot multiple times in a drive-by shooting in Los Angeles on March 9, 1997, as he was leaving a party. He died an hour later. He was 24. 

His murder remains unsolved as well

Natalie Wood, 1981

Thirty-six years after Natalie Wood drowned off the coast of Catalina Island in California, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department in February re-opened the investigation into her mysterious death. With her then-husband, Robert Wagner, now a person of interest, Wood's case remains one of many celebrity deaths still shrouded in suspicion, at least among some detectives. 

On Nov. 29, 1981, the child star-turned-Oscar-nominated actress disappeared from her yacht under circumstances that remain murky at best. Hours later, her body was found, clad in a flannel nightgown, red down jacket and blue socks, floating in the Pacific about a mile away from the yacht and off the island's Blue Cavern Point. 

Her death was ruled an accidental drowning at the time. But the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department reopened the case in 2011; the following year, the cause of death on her death certificate was changed to "drowning and other undetermined factors."

Now detectives have reopened the case again. So far, no charges have been filed against Wagner or anybody else.

Marilyn Monroe, 1962

Beautiful, glamorous and doomed. Hollywood's most vibrant star died suddenly at just age 36. She was found dead in her bed on August 5, 1962, at her Los Angeles home, apparently due to a barbiturate overdose.

Her death was officially ruled a probable suicide: She slipped into a coma after taking too many sleeping pills. But many fans thought it might have been an accidental overdose. Moreover, conspiracy theories about her demise have never entirely evaporated. Plenty of people to this day are willing to believe she was murdered and that the Kennedys might have had something to do with it since she supposedly had affairs with both President Kennedy and his brother Robert Kennedy.

But it's all bunk. The coroner ruled at the time she had too many barbiturates in her body for it to have been an accident. She had overdosed before and suffered from sharp mood swings. The Los Angeles County District Attorney's office reviewed the case in 1982 but found no evidence to support any of the theories, and backed the findings of the original investigation. 

Bob Crane ('Hogan's Heroes'), 1978

Bob Crane, star of the TV comedy Hogan's Heroes, was found beaten to death in his Phoenix-area apartment at age 49, an electrical cord wound around his throat. Police found that Crane had filmed and photographed pornography, and had possibly been bludgeoned with a camera tripod. They suspected his friend, John Carpenter, had killed him but lacked DNA evidence. Crane's oldest son, Robert Crane, wrote a book exploring his father's death

David Carradine ('Kill Bill'), 2009

Thai police found David Carradine, the actor and martial artist who starred in both Kill Bill films, naked and hanging in the closet of his Bangkok hotel room, authorities told the BBC. The 72-year-old was in Thailand to work on his latest film, Stretch, a manager said. A private autopsy found Carradine died of asphyxiation, ruling out suicide but leaving open the possibility of accidental death, per the Hollywood Reporter. His widow settled a wrongful death suit against the company behind the film in 2011, claiming an assistant was supposed to help Carradine navigate the city, but abandoned him the night before police found his body.

Elizabeth Short, the 'Black Dahlia,' 1947

One of the most famous cold cases in U.S. history, 22-year-old Elizabeth Short was found naked in a vacant Los Angeles lot, her body cut in half at the waist, drained of blood and posed. Her face had been cut from ear to ear, and investigators later found evidence that she had been bound. It was the gruesome death of Short, an aspiring actress, that catapulted her into celebrity with an iconic name: Black Dahlia. Her murder remains unsolved over six decades later.

Jack Nance ('Eraserhead'), 1997

The actor, star of cult favorites Eraserhead and Twin Peaks, met up with friends at a coffee shop in South Pasadena, Calif., on the afternoon of Dec. 29, as People recounts. He had a bruised eye. "I told off some kid," he said, as actress Catherine Case later recalled. "I guess I got what I deserved." Case's husband, screenwriter Leo Bulgarini, found Nance dead the next day on the floor of his apartment. Authorities later determined Nance suffered blunt-force trauma to his head and had fought with two men at a doughnut shop the day prior, suffering a blow to the head.

William Desmond Taylor, silent film director, 1922

William Desmond Taylor had directed dozens of silent films when police found the 49-year-old lying on the living room floor of his Los Angeles bungalow with a bullet in his back, according to History. After his death, a love note to him from Mary Miles Minter, a young star of his silent films, was reportedly found in Taylor's home. Minter later admitted that she and her mother, Charlotte Shelby, had been at Taylor's home on the night of his killing, according to History. And the gun used in Taylor's killing matched the one Minter had once tried to shoot herself with before. No prosecutions ever came in the case, which remains unsolved.

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