Marilyn Monroe, that is. Not The Almighty Heidi.






One thing that marks the death of Marilyn Monroe as bizarre is the conflicting stories of witnesses about what they did, what they knew, and what they discovered the night of her death. But that’s not all they dispute. They dispute many of the other facets of the timeline presented in the previous post. Before arguing on behalf of one conclusion or another, I’d like to present the competing and contradictory eyewitness accounts of her last week.


The Official Story

The version of events presented by housekeeper Eunice Murray (left), Monroe’s personal physician Dr. Hyman Engleberg and her psychiatrist, Dr. Ralph Greenson is generally regarded as the official one.

Monroe had become despondent over a romantic breakup (presumably with Robert Kennedy), and his refusal to return her phone calls. She also stressed over the delays in the filming of her next movie Something’s Got to Give. She had become somewhat paranoid about her associates, accusing them of being either Kennedy plants or Mafia spies.

Murray said that she went to bed around 10:00pm on the night of August 4, 1962. She passed by Monroe’s bedroom at 3:00am the following morning, and saw the lights on under the crack between the door and the floor. She tried to open the door, but it was locked. Fearing the worst, she called both Dr. Engleberg and Dr. Greenson. Greenson forced entry through her bedroom window and found Monroe stretched out nude on the bed with the telephone in her hand. Both he and Engleberg examined her, but quickly realized that she had died. They called the police at 4:25am.

Because of her history of suicide attempts, the strain of her filming schedule, and the amount of Nembutal in her system (enough to kill ten people), Los Angels County Medical Examiner Dr. Theodore Curphey ruled her death a suicide.



Norman Jeffries and James Hall’s Version

Jeffries, Murray’s son-in-law, had been installing a new kitchen floor at Monroe’s place that week. He drove Murray, who had spent the previous night at her own apartment, to the house. They arrived at 8:00am on August 4, 1962. Monroe came into the kitchen briefly for a glass of grapefruit juice at about 8:30, met with a representative of Playboy at 9:30am, then went back to bed before being aroused awake for good by Newcomb at 12:00am

At about 1:00, Murray asked for her son-in-law's help in moving her belongings because Monroe had just fired her. Murray called Dr. Greenson immediately. According to Jeffries, however, Greenson didn’t arrive until 4:30pm. Jeffries also said that Robert Kennedy and Peter Lawford arrived around 3:00pm. Lawford told them to get lost while he and Kennedy spoke to Monroe privately. The attorney general and his brother-in-law left around 4:00pm.

At. 9:45 pm, Kennedy returned with two men in tow. The Attorney General ordered him and Murray to leave the premises. They then went to the house next door to stay, and returned at 10:30pm. They heard Monroe’s poodle Maf (short for Mafia—the dog was a present from Frank Sinatra) barking near the guest cottage, where they found Monroe unconscious, but still alive, so they called paramedics.

Newcomb and Lawford arrived before the ambulance came. Paramedics James Hall and Murray Liebowitz claimed that they saw Newcomb and Lawford at the scene. Moments after they got there, Dr. Greenson pulled up. Thirty minutes later Dr. Engleberg joined them. Hall tried to inject a shot of adrenaline directly into Monroe’s heart, but struck a rib instead. Monroe began to revive on her own, however. At that point, according to Hall, Greenson injected her breast with an unknown drug (perhaps chloral hydrate, which slows the metabolism of Nembutal). She died shortly thereafter. Hall and Jeffries then moved the body to the bedroom, while an unnamed plainclothes West Los Angeles Police detective instructed them on how to make the death look like a suicide.


Peter Lawford’s Version

Despite their recent falling out, Sinatra loaned Lawford (left) his private jet to fly out to Cal-Neva Lodge the previous weekend. According to him, he spent time there with Joe DiMaggio Sr. and Monroe. He and Monroe returned together on Sinatra’s plane.

Lawford said he didn’t have much contact with her the following week. After eating dinner with Newcomb and Joe Naar at his house, he called Monroe at about 7:45 to invite her over for a party. She said she didn’t feel like coming, and cryptically added, “Say goodbye to the President….You’re a nice guy.”

The cryptic remark didn’t sit well with Lawford, so he called his manager and friend Milt Ebbens for advice. Ebbens told him not to go to Monroe’s house if she were suicidal because that would look bad for his brothers-in-law were he to find her dead. Ebbens instead called Monroe’s attorney Milton Rudin, who then called the house at 8:30. Murray answered, and went to check on Monroe, who said she felt fine.

Still, Lawford worried. He called again around 10:30pm, but both telephone lines were busy. So he called Naar, who had left the party early, and asked him to check on Monroe. Before Naar had a chance to leave, he received another call from Milton Rudin telling him that a trip to Monroe’s house “wouldn’t be necessary.”

In 1982, Lawford gave reporters what he thought would be a deathbed interview (he actually passed away two years later). He denied that Monroe had had an affair with either John Kennedy or Robert Kennedy. He further insisted that he did not visit Monroe on August 4, 1962.



Ken Hunter’s Version

Paramedic Ken Hunter said that he responded to a call at 12305 North Helena Drive shortly after 12:00 midnight on August 5, 1962. He found Monroe in her bed comatose, but still alive. He and his partner transported her to Santa Monica Hospital where she died shortly after her arrival.



Elizabeth Pollard’s Version

Pollard claimed to have seen Robert Kennedy enter Monroe’s house at 3:00pm on August 4, 1962. While playing cards with several friends later that evening, she saw him return with two other men just as the sun had set (approximately 8:00pm PDT). According to her, one man carried a bag similar to the kind that doctors use.


Jose Bolanos’s Version

Bolanos and Monroe both claimed to have met in February 1962 in Acapulco (Mexico). They fell in love, and met twice after that: once in New York, and again in Los Angeles, where he accompanied her to the Golden Globe Awards show. According to him, the two planned to marry sometime in 1963.

Bolanos called her at 9:30pm on the night of August 4, 1962, and told him a number of secrets that he described as “shocking.” About twenty minutes into their conversation, she told him that someone was at the door. She put down the phone, but never returned.


Fred Otash’s Version

During her final week of life, Monroe allegedly met with private investigator Fred Otash to ask for his help in debugging her house. Ostensibly, she wanted to see if she could lure Robert Kennedy there so that she could blackmail him. Otash didn’t tell her, however, that he had already done the actual bugging of her house and wiretapping of her telephone with help from Jimmy Hoffa associate Bernie Spindel. A chain of unknown persons paid him for the job, so Otash never knew for sure the actual identity of his client. Nevertheless, he speculated that either the Mafia, Hoffa, or both wanted to blackmail the Kennedys.

While monitoring the house on August 4, Otash recorded a heated argument between Monroe and Robert Kennedy at approximately 3:30pm. “Where is it?” Kennedy thundered repeatedly, as the clacking of closet hangers, and the opening of drawers loomed in the background. Intermittently, the voice of a second man appeared, but the volume of his voice was too soft to make out actual words.




Sam Giancana (lesser)’s Version

In his book Double Cross: The Explosive, Inside Story of the Mobster Who Controlled America (co-written by Chuck Giancana, the elder Sam's little brother), Giancana said that his godfather Sam put out a hit on Monroe. The purpose was to blackmail Robert Kennedy by tying him romantically to Monroe, and then leaving evidence that would implicate him in her murder. Working with a fellow mobster, Johnny Roselli, they began to set up the wet job during Monroe’s stay at the Cal-Neva Lodge. They hired professional hitmen Anthony Spilotro and “Milwaukee” Phil Alderisio, who boasted to the younger Giancanas that he and his “boys” had given Marilyn a “poisoned suppository.”



Richard Slatzer’s Version

Slatzer (pictured left with Monroe) claimed to have been a close friend of Marilyn’s since 1945. He also claimed that he married her in 1952. During the week of her death, she allegedly showed him her diary, which detailed her affairs with President John Kennedy and his brother Robert. On the day of her death, he said he went to Monroe’s house, where Murray served them hamburgers for lunch. As they ate, Monroe fired Pat Newcomb, who refused to leave.