Deaths in 2002

The following is a list of notable deaths in 2002. Names are listed under the date of death and not the date it was announced. Names under each date are listed in alphabetical order by family name.

Deaths of notable animals (that is, those with their own Wikipedia articles) are also reported here.

A typical entry lists information in the following sequence:

• Name, age, country of citizenship and reason for notability, established cause of death, reference.

January 2002

• 2 Armi Aavikko, 43, Finnish beauty queen and singer
• 2 Zac Foley, 31, bass guitarist for EMF
• 3 Freddy Heineken, 78, beer magnate
• 7 Jon Lee, 33, British drummer
• 8 M. S. Bartlett, 91, British statistician
• 8 Dave Thomas, 69, US entrepreneur, founder of Wendy's hamburger restaurants
• 11 Julian Faber, 84, English business executive
• 11 Cyrus Vance, 87, former United States Secretary of State, international peacemaker
• 12 Stanley Unwin, 90, comedian
• 13 Ted Demme, film and television director
• 15 Jeremy Hawk, 83, British actor
• 16 Bobo Olson, American boxer
• 16 Ron Taylor, American actor
• 17 Camilo José Cela, 85, Spanish writer, Nobel Prize in Literature
• 17 Peter Adamson, 71, British actor
• 17 Diana Boddington, 80, British stage manager
• 17 Brian Simon, 86, British educationalist and historian
• 18 Alex Hannum, 78, pro basketball coach
• 19 Jeff Astle, 59, English footballer
• 20 Luule Viilma, 51, Estonian doctor, esotericist and practitioner of alternative medicine, died in car crash.
• 21 Peggy Lee, 81, American singer & actress
• 22 Eric de Maré, 91, architectural photographer and writer
• 23 Paul Aars, 67, American stock car driver
• 23 Pierre Bourdieu, sociologist
• 23 Robert Nozick, philosopher
• 28 Dick Lane, 73, American football player
• 28 Astrid Lindgren, 98, Swedish children's book author, pneumonia
• 29 Stephen Wayne Anderson, 48, convicted murderer. executed by lethal injection at San Quentin State Prison in California.

February 2002

• 6 Max Perutz, founder of molecular biology
• 7 Elisa Bridges, 28, Playboy model
• 7 Jack Fairman, 88, British Formula One driver
• 8 Joachim Hoffmann, German historian
• 8 Bob Wooler, 76, British disc jockey
• 9 Princess Margaret, 71, British royal family (sister of Queen Elizabeth II)
• 11 Barry Foster, 74, (heart attack), British actor
• 12 Theresa Bernstein, 111, artist
• 12 William Lee Dwyer, 72, United States federal judge
• 12 George Eiferman, 76, bodybuilder, won Mr.Universe in 1962
• 12 John Eriksen, 44, Danish footballer
• 13 Waylon Jennings, 64, country music performer, actor, disc jockey, former member of Buddy Holly's band
• 15 Mike Darr baseball player
• 15 Howard K. Smith, TV journalist
• 15 Kevin Smith, played Ares on Xena series
• 16 John W. Gardner, American politician
• 16 Sir Walter Winterbottom, 89, British football manager
• 19 Virginia Hamilton, African American, award-winning children's book author
• 21 John Thaw, 60, (cancer), British actor, most famous for the detective series Morse and The Sweeney
• 21 A. L. Barker, British author
• 22 Sir Roden Cutler, 85, Australian diplomat
• 22 Brendan O'Dowda, 76, Irish tenor
• 22 Sir Raymond Firth, 100, British anthropologist
• 22 Chuck Jones, US animator
• 24 Martin Esslin, 83, writer and drama producer
• 24 Leo Ornstein, 109, radical composer/pianist
• 27 Spike Milligan, 83, Irish actor, comedian and writer
• 28 Mary Stuart, 75, soap opera actress best known for her 35-year starring role on Search for Tomorrow

March 2002

• 1 Roger Plumpton Wilson,96, British Anglican prelate.
• 3 Al Pollard, NFL player and broadcaster, lymphoma [1]
• 11 Rudolf Hell, 100, German inventor and manufacturer
• 13 Hans-Georg Gadamer, German philosopher
• 14 Tan Yu, 75, Filipino entrepreneur
• 17 Rosetta LeNoire, 90, African-American stage and television actress
• 18 Maude Farris-Luse, 115, supercentenarian & one-time "Oldest Recognized Person in the World"
• 20 Ivan Novikoff, 102, Russian premier ballet master
• 24 César Milstein, 74, Argentinian biochemist
• 25 Kenneth Wolstenholme, 81, British football commentator
• 27 Milton Berle, American comedian dubbed "Mr. Television"
• 27 Dudley Moore, 66, UK actor and writer
• 27 Billy Wilder, 95, Austrian-born American film director (Double Jeopardy)
• 29 Rico Yan, 27, Filipino movie & TV actor
• 30 Queen Elizabeth (née Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon), 101, Britain's "Queen Mum"; mother of Queen Elizabeth II
• 31 Barry Took, 73, UK comedian and writer

April 2002

• 5 Layne Staley, 34, former Alice in Chains frontman, died after injecting a mixture of heroin and cocaine known as a "speedball"
• 6 Margaret Wingfield, 90, British political activist
• 7 John Agar, 82, American actor (as well as the first husband of actress/politician Shirley Temple Black)
• 8 María Félix, Mexican film star
• 10 Géza Hofi , 75 Hungarian humorist
• 14 Sir Michael Kerr, 81, British justice
• 15 Byron White, United States Supreme Court justice
• 16 Franz Krienbühl, Swiss speed skater
• 16 Robert Urich, 55, American TV actor
• 18 Thor Heyerdahl, 87, Norwegian anthropologist
• 18 Cy Laurie, 75, British musician.
• 19 (Body discovered), Layne Staley, singer (Alice in Chains)
• 23 Linda Boreman, formerly known as Linda Lovelace, 53, former porn star turned political activist; killed in a car crash
• 25 Lisa Lopes, American singer; killed in car crash in Honduras
• 25 Indra Devi (aged 102; "Yoga teacher to the stars")
• 27 Ruth Handler, inventor of the Barbie doll
• 27 Baron Hans Heinrich Thyssen-Bornemisza, German Industrialist and art collector
• 28 Alexander Lebed, Russian general and politician
• 28 Sir Peter Parker, 77, British businessman.
• 28 Lou Thesz, professional wrestler
• 29 Liam O'Sullivan, Scottish footballer, drugs overdose [2]

May 2002

• 1 John Nathan-Turner, 54, British television producer
• 2 William Thomas Tutte, 84, Bletchley Park cryptographer and British, later Canadian, mathematician.
• 3 Barbara Castle, 91, British Labour politician and female life peer
• 3 Mohamed Haji Ibrahim Egal, 73, president of Somaliland and formerly prime minister of Somalia and British Somaliland.
• 3 Mohan Singh Oberoi, 103, Indian hotelier and retailer
• 5 Sir Clarence Seignoret 83, president of Dominica (1983–1993).
• 5 Hugo Banzer Suárez, 75, president of Bolivia, as dictator 1971-1978 and democratic president 1997-2001
• 6 Pim Fortuyn, 54, assassinated Dutch politician
• 7 Seattle Slew, 28, last triple crown winner on 25th anniversary of winning Kentucky Derby
• 10 Lynda Lyon Block, 54, convicted murderer, executed by electric chair in Alabama.
• 10 Leslie Dale Martin, 35, convicted murderer, executed by lethal injection in Louisiana
• 11 Joseph Bonanno, 97, Sicilian former Mafia boss
• 13 Morihiro Saito, 74, a teacher of the Japanese martial art of aikido
• 13 Ruth Cracknell, 76, redoubtable Australian actress most famous for the long-running role of Maggie Beare in the series "Mother and Son"
• 13 Valery Lobanovsky, 63, former Ukrainian coach
• 15 Nellie Shabalala, 49, South African singer and wife of leader/founder of Ladysmith Black Mambazo, Joseph Shabalala.
• 16 Edwin Alonzo Boyd, 88, Canadian bank-robber and prison escapee of the 1950s
• 16 Alec Campbell, 103, Australia's last surviving ANZAC died in a nursing home
• 17 Earl Hammond, 80, American voice actor best known for voicing Mumm Ra and Jaga in the television series Thundercats
• 17 Joe Black, 78, Baseball first Black pitcher to win a World Series game
• 18 Davey Boy Smith, 39, 'British Bulldog' professional wrestler
• 19 John Gorton, 90, 19th Prime Minister of Australia
• 20 Stephen Jay Gould, 60, paleontologist and popular science author
• 21 Niki de Saint Phalle, 71, French artist
• 22 (remains discovered; actual death probably took place on or around May 1, 2001), Chandra Levy, 24, U.S. Congressional intern
• 23 Sam Snead, 89, golfer
• 26 Mamo Wolde, 69, Ethiopian marathon runner
• 28 Napoleon Beazley, 25, convicted juvenile offender, executed by lethal injection in Texas.

June 2002

• 1 Hansie Cronje, 32, (air crash), South African cricketer
• 4 Fernando Belaúnde Terry, democratic president of Peru, 1963–1968 and 1980–1985
• 4 John W. Cunningham, 86, American author
• 4 Caroline Knapp, 42, author of Drinking: A Love Story
• 5 Dee Dee Ramone, founding member of The Ramones
• 6 Hans Janmaat, controversial far-right politician in the Netherlands
• 10 John Gotti, imprisoned mobster
• 11 Robbin Crosby, guitarist of rock band Ratt
• 11 Robert Roswell Palmer, historian, writer
• 12 Bill Blass, fashion designer
• 14 Jose Bonilla boxing former world champion, of asthma
• 14 June Jordan, 65, American writer and teacher, of breast cancer
• 15 Said Belqola, Moroccan referee of the 1998 FIFA World Cup final
• 17 Fritz Walter, football player, captain of 1954 World Cup winners
• 17 Willie Davenport, Olympic Games champion
• 18 Jack Buck, Major League Baseball announcer
• 18 Nancy Addison, 54, soap actress died of cancer
• 19 Count Flemming Valdemar of Rosenborg, 80, Danish prince
• 21 Henry Keith, Baron Keith of Kinkel, 80, British jurist
• 22 Ann Landers, author & syndicated newspaper columnist
• 22 Darryl Kile, 33, Major League Baseball player
• 23 Pedro "El Rockero" Alcazar, Panamanian boxer; died after losing his world Flyweight championship to Fernando Montiel in Las Vegas the night before
• 23 Arnold Weinstock, 77, British businessman
• 24 Miles Francis Stapleton Fitzalan-Howard, 86, 17th Duke of Norfolk
• 24 Pierre Werner, former Prime Minister of Luxembourg, "father of the Euro"
• 26 Jay Berwanger, college football player, first winner of the Heisman Trophy
• 27 John Entwistle, 57, (heart attack), bassist for The Who
• 28 Arthur "Spud" Melin, responsible for marketing hula-hoop and frisbee
• 29 Rosemary Clooney, 74, singer
• 30 Dave Wilson, 70, American television director

July 2002

• 4 Winnifred Van Tongerloo, oldest living survivor of the Titanic
• 4 Benjamin O. Davis Jr., African-American General
• 5 Ted Williams, Baseball Hall of Fame member
• 5 Katy Jurado, 68, Mexican actress who was once married to Ernest Borgnine
• 6 Dhirubhai Ambani, Indian businessman (b. 1932)
• 6 John Frankenheimer, 74, film director
• 8 Sir Robert Bellinger, 92, former Lord Mayor of London
• 8 Ward Kimball, Disney animator
• 9 Rod Steiger, 77, (kidney failure), actor
• 9 Laurence Janifer, science fiction writer
• 10 John Wallach, journalist
• 13 Yousuf Karsh, 93, celebrity portrait photographer as "Karsh of Ottawa"
• 14 Joaquín Balaguer, 95, former President of the Dominican Republic
• 15 Samantha Runnion, 5, child who was kidnapped, sexually abuse and murdered by Alejandro Avila
• 16 Alan Charles Clark, 82, British Roman Catholic prelate
• 16 John Cocke, key figure in the development of RISC architecture
• 16 Jack Olsen, "True crime" writer
• 19 Alexander Ginzburg, leading Soviet dissident (alternatively Aleksandr Ginzburg)
• 19 Alan Lomax, documenter of blues and folk songs
• 21 John Cunningham, 84, British World War II fighter pilot
• 22 Prince Ahmed bin Salman, member of the Saudi Arabian royal family, owner of Kentucky Derby and Preakness Stakes winner War Emblem
• 22 Chuck Traynor, 64, American pornographer
• 23 Alberto Castillo, 87, Argentine tango singer and actor
• 23 Leo McKern, 82, Australian actor best known for playing Rumpole of the Bailey and one of the Number Twos in The Prisoner
• 23 William Pierce, rocket scientist, neo-Nazi, author of "The Turner Diaries"
• 23 Chaim Potok, 73, US author
• 24 Maurice Denham, 92, British actor
• 24 Mike Clark, 61, former NFL kicker
• 25 Abdur Rahman Badawi, Egyptian existentialist philosopher
• 29 Peter Bayliss, 80, British actor

August 2002

• 1 Jack Tighe, 88, American baseball coach
• 3 Carmen Silvera, 80, UK television and theatre actress (Dad's Army, 'Allo 'Allo!)
• 3 (approx date) Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman child- murder victims
• 5 Josh Ryan Evans, American actor ("Timmy" on Passions)
• 5 Chick Hearn, television and radio announcer for the Los Angeles Lakers basketball team since 1960
• 5 Franco Lucentini, 82, Italian writer (The Sunday Woman)
• 6 Edsger Dijkstra, computer scientist
• 9 George Alfred Barnard, 86, British statistician
• 10 Doris Wishman, cult movie director
• 12 Enos Slaughter, baseball Hall of Famer
• 12 Marjorie Williamson, university administrator
• 14 Larry Rivers, American painter
• 14 Dave Williams, singer of Drowning Pool
• 15 Jesse Brown, former United States Secretary of Veterans Affairs
• 18 David Keynes Hill, 87, British biophysicist
• 19 Abu Nidal, terrorist
• 19 Sunday Silence, thoroughbred race horse, winner of the Kentucky Derby and the Preakness Stakes
• 20 Augustine Geve, Solomon Islands Cabinet Minister, assassinated
• 22 Allan George Bromley, 55, computer scientist, historian of computing
• 24 Wayne Simmons, American Football player
• 24 Hoyt Wilhelm, Baseball Hall of Fame member
• 25 Dorothy Hewett, Australian poet, playwright and novelist
• 27 Richard Ricci, Utah handyman suspected of the kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart
• 27 John S. Wilson, 89, American music critic.
• 30 Thomas J. Anderson, 91, American publisher and politician
• 30 Maia Berzina, 91, Russian geographer, cartographer and ethnologer
• 31 Lionel Hampton, 94, jazz musician
• 31 George Porter, 81, British Nobel Prize winner in chemistry

September 2002

• 2 Sir Robert Wilson, 75, British astronomer
• 4 Frankie Albert, National Football League star
• 7 Uziel Gal, designer of the Uzi submachine gun
• 8 Alfonso Ramirez famous Mexican bullfighter
• 11 Johnny Unitas, National Football League Hall of fame quarterback
• 12 Kim Hunter, 79, American stage, television and Oscar-winning film actress (played "Stella Kowalski" in the original Broadway and film versions of A Streetcar Named Desire)
• 15 Robert William Pope, 86, British Anglican prelate, Dean of Gibraltar.
• 16 Archibald Hall, 78, British criminal
• 18 Bob Hayes, National Football League Dallas Cowboys star, and Olympic games Hall of Fame member
• 19 Sergei Bodrov Jr., Russian movie star
• 21 Angelo Buono, Jr., the "Hillside Strangler"
• 21 Robert L. Forward, physicist and science fiction author
• 22 Joseph Nathan Kane, 103, American historian and author
• 22 Jan de Hartog, novelist and playwright
• 22 Anthony Milner, 77, British musician
• 30 Robert Battersby, 77, British soldier and politician

October 2002

• 1 Walter Annenberg, publisher and philanthropist
• 2 Heinz von Foerster, physicist and philosopher, one of the founders of constructivism
• 3 Bruce Paltrow, television and film producer, father of actress Gwyneth Paltrow with Blythe Danner
• 4 Alphonse Chapanis, a founder of ergonomics
• 6 Claus von Amsberg, diplomat; husband of Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands
• 9 Aileen Wuornos, 46, convicted of killing six men, lethal injection
• 12 Sir Desmond Fitzpatrick, 89. British general.
• 12 Audrey Mestre, 28, French world record-setting free diver
• 12 Nozomi Momoi, 24, Japanese AV idol
• 13 Stephen Ambrose, 66, historian and author of "Band of Brothers"
• 17 Derek Bell, Member of The Chieftains, harpist
• 17 Henri Renaud, 67, French jazz pianist and record company executive
• 18 Roman Tam, Hong Kong canto-pop singer
• 19 Manuel Alvarez Bravo, 100, pre-eminent Mexican photographer
• 20 Barbara Berjer, soap opera actress for over thirty years
• 21 Beatrice Serota, Baroness Serota, 83, British politician
• 22 Richard Helms, former CIA director
• 23 David Henry Lewis, 85, New Zealand sailor and adventurer
• 24 Winton M. Blount last United States Postmaster General to have served in a Presidential Cabinet
• 24 Harry Hay, US gay rights activist and Mattachine Society founder
• 24 Adolph Green, 87, American lyricist and playwright
• 25 Richard Harris, 72, (Hodgkin's disease), Irish actor & singer
• 25 Paul Wellstone, United States Senator
• 28 Margaret Booth, 104, Academy Award-winning film editor
• 29 Chang-Lin Tien, educator, 7th Chancellor of the University of California, Berkeley
• 30 Jam Master Jay, 37, DJ of Run DMC, murdered
• 31 Yuri Ahronovitch, Russian conductor
• 31 Baroness Hylton-Foster, 94, British peer

November 2002

• 2 Charles Sheffield, science fiction author and physicist
• 2 Brian Behan, Irish writer, younger brother of Brendan Behan
• 2 Tonio Selwart, 106, Bavarian actor and Broadway performer
• 3 Jonathan Harris, TV's "Dr. Smith" on Lost in Space
• 3 Lonnie Donegan, 71, skiffle musician
• 4 Antonio Margheriti, 72, Italian filmmaker, heart attack
• 6 Sid Sackson, board game designer
• 7 Rudolf Augstein, founder and chief editorialist of the German newsweekly Der Spiegel
• 8 Dorothy Mackie Low, 86, British novelist
• 9 Merlin Santana, 26, actor
• 14 Eddie Bracken, 87, actor
• 15 Myra Hindley, 60, the Moors murderess
• 15 John Joseph Stewart,79, New Zealand rugby coach
• 16 Sir George Gardiner, 67, British politician
• 17 Abba Eban, 88, Israeli foreign affair minister
• 18 James Coburn, 74, Oscar-winning actor, heart attack
• 19 Prince Alexandre de Merode, International Olympic Committee member, lung cancer
• 21 Hadda Brooks, 86, American jazz singer, pianist and composer
• 21 J. Roger Pichette, 81, Canadian politician
• 22 Christine Marion Fraser, 64, Scottish novelist
• 23 Roberto Matta, 91 Chilean artist
• 24 John Rawls, 81, political theorist
• 26 Verne Winchell, founder of Winchell's Donuts (nicknamed "The Donut King")
• 27 Stanley Black, 89, British musician
• 30 Tim Woods, 68, professional wrestler who wrestled as Mr. Wrestling, heart attack, heart attack

December 2002

• 3 Glenn Quinn, 32, Irish actor
• 5 Roone Arledge, 71, Creator of Monday Night Football and Nightline
• 5 Ne Win, 91, Burmese dictator,
• 6 Ernest West Basden, 50, convicted murderer, executed by lethal injection in North Carolina
• 6 Charles Rosen, Pioneer in artificial intelligence
• 7 Paddy Tunney, Irish traditional artist
• 6 Father Philip Berrigan, 79, priest, political activist, cancer
• 9 Stan Rice, 60, painter, educator, poet, husband of author Anne Rice, cancer
• 10 Desmond Keith Carter, 35, convicted murderer, executed by lethal injection in North Carolina.
• 10 Andres Küng, Swedish journalist, writer, entrepreneur and politician of Estonian origin.
• 10 Ian MacNaughton, director of most episodes of Monty Python's Flying Circus
• 12 Dee Brown, 94, author (Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee)
• 13 Zal Yanofsky member of The Lovin' Spoonful music group.
• 17 John Aubrey Davis, Sr., 90, American civil rights activist.
• 17 Hank Luisetti, basketball star and innovator
• 17 Ernest Marvin Carter, Jr., convicted murderer, executed by lethal injection in Oklahoma.
• 18 Bert Millichip, British football administrator
• 18 Wayne Owens, 65, former U.S. Congressman (D-UT), heart attack
• 18 Ramon John Hnatyshyn, 68, former Governor-General of Canada, pancreatitis
• 19 Arthur Rowley, English Footballer, holder of the record for most career league goals scored.
• 20 Joanne Campbell, British actress who starred in the comedy series, Me and My Girl (1980s)
• 22 Kenneth Tobey, prolific character actor (appeared in about 100 films including: Twelve O'Clock High, Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, The Thing from Another World and Airplane!), natural causes
• 22 Desmond Hoyte, President of Guyana from 1985 to 1992
• 23 Joe Strummer, former singer for The Clash.
• 24 James Ferman, 72, American film censor.
• 24 Jake Thackray, English singer-songwriter, heart failure
• 25 William T. Orr, television executive (brought Maverick, F-Troop and 77 Sunset Strip to TV)
• 26 Herb Ritts, celebrity photographer
• 26 Armand Zildjian, cymbals manufacturer
• 27 George Roy Hill, film director (Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, The Sting)
• 30 Mary Wesley, 90, novelist, author of The Camomile Lawn

See also

For earlier deaths, see Deaths in 2001, Deaths in 2000, 1999, 1998, 1997, 1996, 1995, 1994 etc..