Death of Minor Celebrities

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LOS ANGELES — Celebrity plastic surgeon Dr. Frank Ryan, who made headlines for performing multiple surgeries on reality TV star Heidi Montag, has died. He was 50 years old.

The California Highway Patrol says Ryan's 1995 Jeep Wrangler went off the side of Pacific Coast Highway near Malibu and landed on its roof Monday afternoon.

Besides Montag, Ryan's celebrity clientele included musician Vince Neil, actor Lorenzo Lamas, reality stars Lisa Gastineau and Adrianne Curry and several models and beauty queens.

(June 20, 2010) Edith Shain, the nurse in Alfred Eisenstead's famous Victory over Japan Day In Times Square photo, died in Los Angeles. She was 91.

José Desiderio Rodriguez Lima (September 30, 1972 – May 23, 2010) was a Dominican right-handed pitcher who spent thirteen seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) with the Detroit Tigers (1994–1996, 2001–2002), Houston Astros (1997–2001), Kansas City Royals (2003, 2005), Los Angeles Dodgers (2004) and New York Mets (2006). His best year in the majors was 1999, when he won 21 games for the Astros and pitched in his only All-Star Game.

A flamboyant free spirit, he was best known for coining all his pitching appearances Lima Time. His overly animated displays of emotion on the mound made him a fan favorite, but also drew the ire of opposing teams. Due to his indulging in musical pursuits beyond baseball, he was once described by The New York Times sportswriter Ben Shpigel as "the national anthem-crooning, towel-waving merengue singer who moonlights as a right-handed pitcher."

Death Of Jose Lima
Jose Lima died at age 37 from a massive heart attack at Huntington Memorial Hospital on May 23, 2010. He had suffered from cardiac problems. His wife said he complained of excess gas while sleeping the night before but she thought he was just having a nightmare.

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Dorothy Height, a leader of the African-American and women’s rights movements who was considered both the grande dame of the civil rights era and its unsung heroine, died on Tuesday in Washington. She was 98.

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Guru, the pioneering hip-hop legend who united jazz and hip-hop as a solo artist and half of the influential duo Gang Starr, has died. He was 43.

Guru, whose real name was Keith Elam, died Monday after a battle with cancer, his producer, Solar, told MTV. Guru was hospitalized late February after suffering cardiac arrest and was briefly in a coma.

Phil Harris (April 28, 1956 - February 9, 2010) was the owner and captain of the crab fishing vessel FV Cornelia Marie, which is featured on the Discovery Channel reality TV series Deadliest Catch. He suffered a stroke while in port at Saint Paul Island, Alaska on January 29, 2010, and died on February 9, 2010.

Harris once stated, "You're not a man 'til you've pulled a tooth out with a pair of pliers."

Bobby Charles (born Robert Charles Guidry, February 21, 1938 – January 14, 2010) was an American singer and songwriter.

Charles helped to pioneer the south Louisiana musical genre known as swamp pop. His compositions include the hits "See You Later, Alligator," which he initially recorded himself as "Later Alligator", but which is best known from the cover version by Bill Haley & His Comets; and "Walking to New Orleans", written for Fats Domino.

"(I Don't Know Why I Love You) But I Do" was a 1950s classic that Charles composed which Clarence "Frogman" Henry had a major hit with and which was on the soundtrack to the 1994 blockbuster Forrest Gump. His composition "Why Are People Like That?" was on the soundtrack to the 1998 movie Home Fries.

In September 2007, The Louisiana Music Hall of Fame honored Charles for his contributions to Louisiana music with an induction.

Death of Bobby Charles
Charles collapsed in his home near Abbeville and died January 14, 2010.

Bobby Charles - No Use Knockin

Kim Peek (11 November 1951 – 19 December 2009) was an American prodigious savant known as a megasavant. He had a photographic or eidetic memory, but also social developmental disabilities, possibly resulting from congenital brain abnormalities. He was the inspiration for the character of Raymond Babbitt, played by Dustin Hoffman, in the movie Rain Man. He was not autistic and likely had FG syndrome.

Kim Peek was born with macrocephaly, damage to the cerebellum, and, perhaps most important, agenesis of the corpus callosum, a condition in which the bundle of nerves that connects the two hemispheres of the brain is missing; in Peek's case, secondary connectors such as the anterior commissure were also missing. There is speculation that his neurons made other connections in the absence of a corpus callosum, which results in an increased memory capacity.

Death of Kim Peek
Peek died on 19 December 2009, of a heart attack. He is survived by his father.  He was 58 years old at the time of his death

Jasmine Kinkade (AKA Jasmine Fiore) (February 18, 1981 - August 15, 2009) from Santa Cruz, California, was a swimsuit model, events promoter, and Las Vegas socialite. Fiore had also obtained a real estate license and was about to open a gym and personal training center. Her body was discovered on August 15, 2009 strangled and stuffed into a suitcase. A former reality show contestant, Ryan Alexander Jenkins (? – August 23, 2009), was named the suspect. Jenkins was found dead in a Hope, British Columbia hotel room on August 23, 2009 of an apparent suicide.

Relationship with Ryan Jenkins
Jasmine Fiore had met Canadian-born Ryan Jenkins at a Las Vegas casino. According to court records, Jenkins was charged in June 2009 in Clark County, Nevada, with a misdemeanor count of "battery constituting domestic violence" for hitting Fiore in the arm. Jenkins was expected to go on trial in December. The pair had reconciled shortly before Fiore's death and were reportedly traveling to Las Vegas for a poker game. Fiore's mother claims that the two fought frequently and that Jenkins had been jealous of Fiore's friendships with her ex-boyfriends.

Death of Jasmine Fiore
Fiore's badly beaten and crushed body was discovered in a suitcase that was placed inside of a dumpster in Buena Park, California, about 20 miles southeast of Los Angeles, on the morning of August 15, 2009. She had also been strangled. According to Buena Park police, Fiore's teeth and fingers had been removed before her nude body was stuffed into the suitcase.

Suspect Ryan Jenkins
On August 21 Jenkins arrived at the Thunderbird Motel in Hope, British Columbia in a vehicle with Alberta license plates, but stayed in the car while a young woman paid cash for 2 nights accomodation. After no one checked out on Sunday, August 23, and having noticed suspiciously little activity over the weekend, the motel manager and his nephew decided to check on the room. Jenkins was found deceased, apparently by suicide; the body was found hanging in the closet.

John Quade (April 1, 1938 - August 9 , 2009) was an American character actor who starred in film and in television. He was best known for his role as Cholla, the leader of the motorcycle gang "The Black Widows" in the 1978 hit film Every Which Way But Loose and the 1980 sequel Any Which Way You Can with Clint Eastwood.

Career
Quade starred in High Plains Drifter and The Outlaw Josey Wales with Clint Eastwood. Further, he also appeared in Papillon with Steve McQueen and Dustin Hoffman. He appeared in many television movies and mini series including Roots and Dream West. Quade starred in two short-lived television series: Flatbush from 1979 and Lucky Luke from 1991.

He made many guest appearances on television shows ranging from Bonanza, Gunsmoke, Knight Rider in the pilot episode "Knight of the Phoenix", Buck Rogers in the 25th Century, The A-Team to On the Air.With his drawling accent, stocky build and squinty eyes, he was often called on to play Southern or rural law enforcement officers.

Death of John Quade
On Sunday, August 9, 2009, Quade died. He was 71

Sky "Sunlight" Saxon (1946 - June 25, 2009) was an American rock and roll musician who was best known as the leader and singer of the 1960s Los Angeles garage rock band The Seeds.

Death of Sky Saxon
Saxon died on June 25, 2009, in an Austin, Texas hospital. He had been hospitalized with what doctors suspected was an infection of the internal organs, but the cause of death has not yet been released. He was reported to be 63 years old

The Seeds - Pushin' Too Hard
Sky Saxon - Lead Singer and Bass guitarist

Johnny Palermo (1982 - June 8, 2009) was an American television actor. He had appeared in more than 30 television shows. He was regular on the Nickelodeon series Just for Kicks, and had appeared in Everybody Hates Chris as Chris' classmate Frank DiPaolo.

Death of Johnny Palermo
Palermo and girlfriend Alessandra Giangrande were both killed in an early morning car crash in North Hollywood.  Johnny Palermo was 27 years old at the time of his death.

Television
Just for Kicks
Everybody Hates Chris
Cold Case
General Hospital
CSI: Miami
Rules of Engagement
How I Met Your Mother
CSI: NY

Independent movie in post production (to be released)
Pizza With Bullets

Barry Beckett (February 4, 1943 - June 10, 2009) born in Birmingham, Alabama was a keyboardist who worked as a session musician with several notable artists on their studio albums. He was also a record producer, most notably of albums by Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, Dire Straits, Joe Cocker, John Prine, McGuinn-Hillman, The Staple Singers, Phoebe Snow, Etta James, T. Graham Brown, Lorrie Morgan, Eddy Raven, Delbert McClinton, Frankie Miller, Jerry Jeff Walker, Alabama, Hank Williams, Jr., Neal McCoy, Confederate Railroad, Phish, Tammy Graham, Sonia Dada, Ilse DeLange and others.

As part of the Fame rhythm section, some of their songs involved are "I Never Loved a Man" (Aretha Franklin), "Land of 1000 Dances" (Wilson Pickett), "Kodachrome" (Paul Simon) and "When a Man Loves a Woman" (Percy Sledge).

He was involved in the "Muscle Shoals Sound", being a member of the Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section, and in 1969, one of the founders of the Muscle Shoals Sound Studio. The Sound studio produced such hits as "Torn Between Two Lovers" (Mary MacGregor) and "Smoke from a Distant Fire" Sanford-Townsend Band). Beckett moved to Nashville in 1982 to become A & R country music director for Warner Brothers Records and co-produced Williams, Jr.'s records with Jim Ed Norman. Beckett produced records independently after leaving Warner Brothers.

Death of Barry Beckett
Barry Beckett had been diagnosed with cancer and suffered strokes.
Barry Beckett was 66 years old at the time of his death.

BEAUTIFUL LOSER BOB SEGER - Barry Beckett on piano

Mickey Ross - An Emmy winning Comedy writer and producer, who worked on "All in the Family," "The Jeffersons" and "Three's Company," died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles of complications from a stroke and heart attack. He was 89

Jay Walter Bennett (November 15, 1963 - May 24, 2009) was an American guitarist, multi-instrumentalist, engineer, producer, and singer-songwriter.

From 1994 through 2001 Bennett was a member of Wilco. Wilco won 2 Grammy Awards so far.

Bennett was a much sought after studio session player as well, having played on albums by Sheryl Crow, Allison Moorer, and Billy Joe Shaver, among many others.

Death of Jay Bennett 
In May 2009, Bennett sued Wilco front man Jeff Tweedy for breach of contract stemming from his work for Wilco. The suit came less than two weeks after Bennett publicly revealed that he needed hip replacement surgery which he could not afford due to lack of health insurance. On May 24, 2009 Bennett died unexpectedly in his sleep.

Jay Bennett's MySpace Page