Gene Hackman death: Can pills, phones, texts and photos unlock mystery?
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It will probably take weeks to sort out the death of actor Gene Hackman and his wife as authorities revealed new details about the case.
The Oscar winner and his wife, Betsy Arakawa, were found dead with one of the family’s three dogs in their New Mexico home by maintenance workers on Wednesday. Authorities said that there were no obvious signs of foul play but that the circumstances of their deaths warranted further investigation.
Where does the investigation go from here?
Besides work from the medical examiner, investigators are looking at pills found at the scene and the couple’s cellphones to piece together the last days of their lives.
“We’ll be analyzing cellphone data, phone calls, text messages, events, photos in the cellphone, to try to piece a timeline together,” Santa Fe Sheriff County Adan Mendoza said Friday.
Authorities said there were no obvious signs of foul play, but that the circumstances of their deaths warranted further investigation.
Investigators removed two phones, blood pressure and thyroid medications, Tylenol, medical records and a 2025 monthly planner from the home, according to a search warrant summary.
The New Mexico Gas Co. did not find any outstanding issues in the home after an extensive investigation for leaks or other issues with the gas lines. The utility company did find a “minuscule leak” in a stove burner, but it was not enough to emit a lethal amount of carbon monoxide, the sheriff’s office said Tuesday. The information was passed on to the medical investigator’s office. The utility company also found several code enforcement violations, but those did not involve gas leaks.
In the coming days, investigators will build a timeline for when the couple were last seen alive and try to evaluate who spoke to them last. Mendoza described Hackman and Arakawa as “private individuals” who kept to themselves. There are no security cameras inside or outside the home for the investigators to draw upon, Mendoza said Friday.
Maintenance workers told investigators that they last spoke to the couple about two weeks before their bodies were found. Arakawa mainly communicated with the workers via text message or in phone calls.
How was the couple found?
Hackman, 95, and Arakawa, 65, were found by a pair of maintenance workers in their housing community shortly before 2 p.m. on Wednesday.
The workers then notified a community caretaker, who went to the home and then called 911.
The caretaker didn’t have all the information when he called but said he was looking through a window at two bodies lying on the floor inside.
The caller can be heard on audio telling the dispatcher that he could see what appeared to be two motionless bodies inside the house. Shaken, he repeatedly says “damn” and urges authorities to rapidly respond.
The bodies of actor Gene Hackman, his wife and their dog were discovered in Santa Fe, N.M., on Wednesday afternoon during a welfare check, officials said.
“No, they are not moving. Please send someone out here quick,” the caller says.
Hackman’s body was found on the floor near the kitchen with a walking cane and a pair of sunglasses nearby, according to a court affidavit. Arakawa’s body was found in a bathroom by the home’s main entrance, and prescription pills were scattered on a nearby countertop. Mendoza said he could not release details about the prescriptions due to the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act.
The positioning of the couple’s bodies indicated that they may have suddenly fallen, according to the affidavit.
A German shepherd was found dead inside the home while two other dogs were alive on the property and able to enter the residence through a door at the back. The dog’s cause of death is unknown.
The bodies of actor Gene Hackman, his wife and their dog were discovered in Santa Fe, N.M., on Wednesday afternoon during a welfare check, officials said.
How did they die?
The cause of the couple’s deaths is still under investigation.
Initial autopsy results ruled out carbon monoxide poisoning and found no signs of blunt force trauma on the couple’s bodies, Mendoza said.
The medical examiner will make a ruling on the official cause of death after receiving full toxicology and autopsy results — a process that he said could take months. Mendoza said at a news conference Friday that Feb. 17 was the last day Hackman’s pacemaker showed activity and that it is “a very good assumption that it was his last day of life.”
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