A producer for "Amazing Race" Jeff Rice was found dead in his Uganda hotel room with production assistant Catherine Fuller. The pair were found with large quantities of cocaine in their stomachs, raising questions about whether they were involved in a botched drug deal or poisoned. Ugandan police maintain the pair simply overdosed. more ›

Griffen Kramer, the 18-year-old Thousand Oaks High School quarterback found dead in October at a buddy's house, died of a heroin overdose, according to toxicology reports released by the L.A. County coroner's office. more ›

Erik Kramer was found dead at the home of his friend David Nernberg in Agoura Hills, but if authorities' suspicions are right, Nernberg might not have been such a pal. more ›

R&B Singer Vesta Williams was found dead in her hotel room in her El Segundo Hotel room yesterday. Initial reports suggest that she might have overdosed on prescription pills. Williams, 53, rose to fame in the 1980s with hits like "Sweet Sweet Love," "Once Bitten Twice Shy" and "Congratulations." more ›

60-year-old actor Jeff Conaway, known for his role on the TV series "Taxi" and as Kenickie in the 1978 musical "Grease," is hospitalized in a coma following a drug overdose, possibly from pain pills, according to his manager Phil Brock, reports the Associated Press. more ›

In a pretrial hearing on Wednesday, Edward Chernoff, a defense lawyer for Michael Jackson's doctor Conrad Murray, said the singer "was so anguished about his deteriorating finances in his final days that he took desperate actions that caused his own death," reports the Associated Press via Billboard. more ›

15-year-old Sasha Rodriguez died of an ecstasy overdose, came the official ruling from the Los Angeles County coroner's office yesterday, according to the AP. The teenager had been at the Electric Daisy Carnival during the last weekend in June this summer when she collapsed amidst the crowd. When she fell, Rodriguez hit her head, and while her friends tried to shield her from being trampled, the crowd overwhelmed them. more ›

Testiomony in a Los Angeles courtroom yesterday in the case against onetime Playboy model Anna Nicole Smith's lawyer and boyfriend Howard K. Stern revealed that the star had an obsession with prescription pills, according to an AP report published in the Press-Telegram. more ›

15-year-old Sasha Rodriguez of Atwater was one of the over 100 people transported out of the Electric Daisy Carnival at the Coliseum this weekend to an area hospital. The teen was in respiratory arrest when she arrived, lapsed into a coma, and experienced organ failure. Sasha "died shortly before 5:30 p.m. Tuesday," according to the LA Times. Her parents had to decide whether to remove her from life support. more ›

Following the death of onetime child star Corey Haim this week from a prescription drug overdose, authorities and the public quickly moved to scrutinize the actor's abuse of the pills and the possibility he had been "doctor shopping"--a practice that involves seeking prescriptions from multiple doctors at the same time. more ›

Detectives investigating the early-morning death of former teen star Corey Haim reportedly "recovered prescription drugs from the home" the actor shared with his mother, according to the LA Times. more ›

Last week the news of the death of Adam Goldstein, better known to many as DJ AM, shocked many people. Although authorities are still working to determine if his death was accidental or suicide, Goldstein apparently died of a drug overdose in his New York apartment, where drug paraphernalia was found. The 36-year-old DJ had recently finished working with Dr. Drew Pinsky on a television show about addiction, and "was said to have agreed to go back to rehab just hours before he died," according to the LAT's blog The Dish Rag. more ›

Andre Young Jr, the 20-year-old son of rap icon Dr. Dre, was found dead in the family's Woodland Hills home this past August. He'd been out with friends the night before, but was unresponsive when his mother, Jenita Porter, tried to rouse him that morning, and was pronounced dead by paramedics. According to People, The Los Angeles County Coroner announced yesterday after months of waiting for the toxicology report that the cause of Young's death was "from an overdose of heroin and morphine," and that the case was both closed and ruled as accidental. more ›

26-year-old skateboarder and photographer Lee Grivas was found dead in his apartment by a neighbor in Hollywood on July 1. There were no signs of physical trauma and it appears to be from a heroin overdose. Applegate and Grivas dated on and off but his drug problem was a factor that often split them up. Right now, there is no official cause of death and is currently being ruled as an accident or suicide pending a the toxicology report. more ›

At 12:01 p.m. today, the USC Department of Public Safety received a call from a Resident's Assistant in New/North (dorms) that a student was not breathing. Captain David Carlisle of USC's DPS said that campus police arrived shortly after the call as well as Los Angeles Fire Department paramedics, who pronounced the man dead upon arrival. Homicide detectives from the LAPD were then called out. After their initial investigation, preliminary reports stated that it appeared to be a drug overdose, prompting a call to the coroner. more ›

more ›

Photo by laurenp! via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr more ›

Photo by GarySe7en via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr more ›

Gothamist, parent site to LAist, is reporting the death of Heath Ledger. "Actor Heath Ledger was found dead in downtown Manhattan apartment by the police. Some reports say he died from an overdose." Ledger lived on Broome street. more ›