. SIREN WAILS DISTANTLY NEWS ANCHOR: We have breaking news, and it's shocking. The actor Heath Ledger has been found dead in his apartment in Manhattan. Heath Ledger was Hollywood's rising star, richly talented with rugged good looks. By his mid-20s, he earned his first Oscar nomination for Brokeback Mountain. Two years later, he delivered one of the big screen's most iconic performances, playing The Joker in the Batman movie The Dark Knight,... This has come as extremely shocking news that definitely nobody saw coming. ...but at 3.36pm on the 22nd of January 2008, Ledger was pronounced dead in the bedroom of his New York apartment. He was just 28 years old. Heath Ledger appeared to be in the prime of his life, a hugely talented actor with a great future ahead of him. His body was taken for autopsy. The medical examiner concluded that he died from an overdose, but was it a tragic accident, or did he deliberately take his own life? Heath Ledger battled drug use,... a personal life in crisis and the psychological trauma of playing The Joker. REPORTER: Any comments on Heath Ledger's death? I warned him. While the circumstances of his death are still unclear, what is certain is that a young life and a promising career were cut short far too soon. Copyright Able 2016 ELECTRICITY CRACKLES Dr Jason Payne-James is an internationally recognised specialist in forensic and legal medicine, called on by the National Crime Agency, the Metropolitan Police and government task forces in the US and the UK. He provided evidence in the Soham murders and the Baby P cases. I've looked at all the publicly available post-mortem information about Heath Ledger. It gives some clues as to how he lived his life... and, I hope, will pinpoint the reasons for his premature death. Just three days before his death, Heath Ledger's on the set of his latest film, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus. He's playing Tony, a mysterious figure who's joined Dr Parnassus' travelling theatre. It's his 15th Hollywood movie, and his career appears to be at an all-time high. At 28, Heath Ledger was in the prime of his life. He was a very physical actor; he liked to do his own stunts and by all reports was very fit and healthy. Despite being tired from a gruelling schedule over the previous few months, with little time off, there appears to be no obvious reason for his death. Starting out in his native Australia, Heath Ledger took time to get noticed, cutting his acting teeth in television soaps like Home and Away, but it was obvious to those that knew him that much greater success was just round the corner. He has such a charisma. You only have to look at his smile to see how he just lights up a stage or screen. In 1997, aged 18, he decided he wanted a career in the movies and tried his luck in Hollywood. It was obviously a big gamble. He'd made a promise to himself that he wasn't going to accept a TV role, even though there were some that were really quite lucrative, and he apparently got down to his last $150 when he got cast. That role in teen comedy 10 Things I Hate About You alerted the business to his star quality. From then his rise was rapid. His first big studio vehicle, A Knight's Tale, came at 21... and was followed by the lead in the action drama The Four Feathers. He was so happy working in what he did. I was only too happy to watch him grow and watch the` watch him get better and better and better. By 25 he had his first Best Actor nomination at the Oscars for his part in Brokeback Mountain, a poignant story of forbidden love between two young cowboys. Heath created a sensitive character troubled by his sexuality. Heath had certain qualities that you don't normally find in our business. He was extremely humble,... never talked about himself; talked about his roles, was extremely kind, generous and kind of egoless and very caring about other people ` very caring. His first w` first words always were not about how he's feeling, to me, but he was caring about how I'm feeling and how everybody else feels, and so` and not afraid to be vulnerable. Never protected himself. Then in 2007, just months before his death, Heath Ledger gave one of the darkest performances ever to hit the silver screen ` Batman's psychopathic nemesis, The Joker. LOW UNSETTLING MUSIC On the set of Doctor Parnassus, Ledger's warming up for the final scene, getting ready for a dangerous stunt. For the past few weeks, he's been filming outside at night in sub-zero temperatures, including scenes where he's hung from a bridge, soaking wet, doused with water. Throughout, he's been fighting off a heavy cold. He had a nasty cough, and he had a fever. Then just at the end, he got a flu,... (COUGHS) ...which was like a horse kick. It was` It knocked him, and it knocked him hard. (COUGHS) He's tired; he's exhausted; he's got a persistent cough, so it's most likely he's developed a secondary bacterial chest infection. I can see from these photographs taken on set that Heath Ledger was smoking. This is significant. Every cigarette you smoke damages hair-like structures lining the air passages called cilia. These remove debris such as mucus and other irritants from the lungs themselves. If you develop an acute chest infection, then the last thing you want to do is to continue smoking, because it may take you longer to recover from that infection. According to the film's director, Terry Gilliam, a doctor recommends antibiotics, but Ledger refuses and perseveres with the tough filming schedule, and on the last night of filming, Heath has to forget about his illness to perform a series of stunts. It's the final London scene, and the production is now relocating to Canada. Heath is exhausted and badly in need of rest. He was not in a good place, bless him, when we wrapped on Parnassus. (COUGHS) As a smoker, Heath Ledger would be more susceptible to the most serious of chest infections, pneumonia. Pneumonia is a condition whereby, in simple terms, small air sacs within the lung tissue fill up with infected fluid. This compromises your ability to breathe properly. Inadequately treated or untreated pneumonia can often be fatal. I said, 'Come home to Dublin. We'll just take it easy. Come back to the house. 'Take a few days out, and then go where you need to go or do whatever you need to do.' Ignoring the advice, Ledger flies home to New York the very next morning. We know that Heath Ledger was unable to shake off flu. It's possible that he had a secondary chest infection ` perhaps pneumonia ` and that might've compromised his ability to breathe, but so far there's no obvious reason why he died. CAR HORN TOOTS Two days before his death. Heath Ledger's flown home from filming in London and then shows up at the Beatrice Inn, an exclusive hang-out favoured by the rich and famous. The Beatrice Inn was a safe place to be extremely beautiful and famous and yet be treated like a relatively normal but beloved human being. Regulars at the bar include Kate Moss, Lindsay Lohan and the Olsen twins,... CHATTER, DANCE MUSIC PLAYS It was the definition of, uh, excruciatingly hip. ...but tonight it's Heath's bizarre appearance that catches the eye. He showed up with a hood pulled up over his head and a ski mask as if attempting to remain anonymous while at the same time being the centre of attention. But Heath Ledger has another reason to conceal his identity. He's been stung by the media on a previous night out. Two years before, a secretly recorded video revealed a hidden lifestyle. It would be trumpeted on teasers on tabloid shows that he had had this terrible drug problem. The video was filmed at the Chateau Marmont hotel, where actor John Belushi died of a drugs overdose in 1982. It was shot at a party just after Ledger and his then-girlfriend, Michelle Williams, had attended a Hollywood awards ceremony on January the 29th 2006. POIGNANT MUSIC HEATH: Why? Um,... The video shows an unidentified man snorting what was claimed to be cocaine from a table in front of Heath, and then Ledger makes a damning admission of his own. Heath's words are significant because they are evidence of a long-standing drug habit. Um, marijuana is one of the most widely used illegal drugs in the world. In the same way as long-term tobacco smoking, long-term marijuana smoking renders you more susceptible to serious chest infections. But in the same video, Heath also claims he has now stopped smoking marijuana. SOMBRE MUSIC We don't see him do any drugs. I don't even know if we see him drinking. You have a video recording that's supposedly the smoking gun that has no smoking gun and no gun, you know. The gun isn't there, and` and there's no smoke. But there is further evidence to suggest Heath may have used hard drugs. I see that the police reported by his body a $20 bill rolled up in the manner often used to snort drugs, for example, cocaine, so was illegal drug use the cause of Heath's behaviour and his subsequent demise? I was hearing stories about Heath ` that he was a cocaine-hoovering rake who was just going around having assignations with everything that moved, didn't care about his family, didn't care about anybody but himself. Newspapers claimed his habit was so out of control he was driven to a celebrity rehab clinic in March 2006, two months after the Chateau Marmont video, but he refused to enter. UNSETTLED MUSIC Ledger strongly denied this allegation. The toxicology report shows no traces of any drug were found on the rolled-up bank note, and toxicology results showed there were no illegal drugs in his system. A sweep of his apartment by police searching for illegal narcotics also drew a blank. This confirmation came as no surprise to Gerry Grenell, Ledger's voice coach. They had shared an apartment for the past few months. We went to work together. We were on set all day together. We returned home together. You know, we cooked meals together. (CHUCKLES) The only thing we didn't do was get into the same sack together. I certainly didn't see anything going on. He wasn't doing drugs either. He was` None o` you know. I mean, you know when` You know when a person's doing drugs. You know that. . The toxicology report does show the presence of prescription drugs in Heath's system at the time of his death ` six prescription drugs. What I need to determine is what role, if any, these drugs played in his death. I can see he's taking diazepam, more commonly known by its brand name, Valium. Valium binds to receptors in the brain which affect the levels of the neurotransmitter gamma-aminobutyric acid. This causes central-nervous-system depression, resulting in calming and sometimes feelings of euphoria. Since Valium was introduced in the 1960s, it's become one of the most widely used drugs to tackle anxiety. Ledger's anxiety may date from the moment he hit Hollywood in his teens, when he found himself painfully at odds with the film business. Heath told me on occasions that he was really keen not to be typecast in pretty-boy,... um, young heart-throb roles. He deliberately shied away from that. But as his Hollywood career took off, Heath realised he was wanted more for his looks than his acting talent. UNSETTLING MUSIC Sony Pictures headquarters, Los Angeles, seven years before Heath Ledger's death. As A Knight's Tale, his first big Hollywood vehicle, was nearing release, Heath met company executives to discuss their plans for his future. They saw him as the next Hollywood heart-throb. Heath was keen for the acting challenge. He was committed to becoming the best actor he could be and took it seriously. He actually did turn down a couple of roles that a lot of people went, 'What?!' He turned down Spider-Man; he turned down Alexander, a film that was gonna be about Alexander the Great. According to his agent, as Sony executives laid down their plans, Heath's anxiety took hold. He suffered a panic attack. A panic attack is an overwhelming anxiety where a person feels they can't breathe. They go dizzy; th` they've chest pains; they have a real sense of dread. < Heath? Here you've got somebody who's very young, with a huge depth of self-awareness about his own ability, his own sense of self, being told, 'You can't be you; you have to be what we want you to be,' and I think that's what caused the inner turmoil for him. But it wasn't just the exploitation of his image that made Heath Ledger anxious and could explain his use of Valium. He didn't like publicity and how that business works. He didn't feel comfortable with talking about himself, and you can see that in some of his, um, interviews he does have a level of discomfort. Um,... I dunno, just living and, uh` and being true to one's self is fairly` I'm fairly passionate about that, so as long as I stay true to that, I think that's` that's a good enough answer. Inevitably, as Ledger's star rose, press interest in his life beyond the camera grew. I don't think Heath was cut out for the trappings of fame. He found the attention the paparazzi focused on him and his girlfriends at times to be distressing. His anxiety about press intrusion intensified after he began dating co-star Michelle Williams on the set of Brokeback Mountain in 2004. He would be followed and hounded by photographers. CAMERAMAN: How are you? It made him angry and annoyed, and he would often spark up against them, and then that would just encourage them to try and push him further. I don't think he came to this business to be famous. I could see that th` he was gonna get hurt. I could see his sensitivity. In 2005, when Heath and Michelle both won Oscar nominations for their roles in Brokeback Mountain, they became hot Hollywood property. It just ratcheted up all the attention, all the speculation to an extent that he didn't feel that he was capable of handling. He said, 'I'll never make another good film again 'if this is what it means getting nominated for an Oscar.' He didn't mean that he would be unable to; he meant that he did make a good film and that he just couldn't handle the outcome, that it's making him miserable and scared and overwrought with anxiety. That's someone who is not sitting well into the Hollywood machine, who greets the nomination of Oscar for Best Actor as a` as a torment. Neither Heath nor Michelle won the Oscar, but later that year, in October 2005, they had a daughter, Matilda Rose. Heath was just... besotted, absolutely besotted with her, adored her, loved being a father, loved the idea of being a father. He was over the moon about his daughter. It was, like,... I'd never seen him so happy. Wary of press intrusion into their new family life, the couple took the decision to move from LA to New York, but Heath was dismayed to find this didn't curb the paparazzi's interest in him. We were out walking with Matilda, and these two guys would not leave him alone, and he went over to the guys and he says, 'Look, take as many photographs as you want, 'but please do not take a photograph of me with my child.' He said, 'I don't want the child in the paper.' So had Heath's anxiety about the trappings of fame led him to a reliance on Valium? And could it have contributed to his death? Valium can be very addictive, but it's difficult to fatally overdose on Valium, and some people have taken many, many times the therapeutic dose, suffering no adverse effects, apart from, perhaps, sleeping for 48 hours, but Valium can be fatal, even at low levels, when mixed with other drugs or alcohol. He did love a glass of good wine; he enjoyed that, but he'd given up alcohol and wouldn't touch any alcohol, hadn't had alcohol for a very long time. Toxicology tests found no alcohol in his system at the time of his death, and it appears that Heath had decided to give up alcohol after the birth of his daughter, so I'm looking for another reason for his death. . MID-TEMPO ROCK MUSIC 36 hours before his death. Heath is having breakfast in one of his regular haunts. His music is on full blast. MID-TEMPO ROCK MUSIC CRESCENDOS Usually polite and friendly, today Ledger seems tired and reserved. I see that one of the drugs that the toxicologist found in Heath's system was doxylamine. This is used to treat sleeplessness or difficulty in getting to sleep. It's an antihistamine, and it works on the central nervous system to induce drowsiness. Heath's battle with sleep disturbance has plagued him for years. Six weeks after his death, Michelle Williams told Interview Magazine that he suffered from insomnia when they met in 2004. She added, 'He just had too much energy. His mind was turning, turning, turning, always turning.' He had artistic energy that was... almost bottomless. It just kept coming, kept on going, kept on going. CLOCK TICKS In September 2007, four months before his death, Heath Ledger and Michelle Williams had a traumatic break-up, and his insomnia intensified. If you're going through psychological and emotional problems, everything is about overthinking and worrying, and when you're in that state of mind, you cannot power down, so this deeply affects your ability to sleep well. Weeks after their separation, Heath admitted to a New York Times journalist that he was sleeping on average two hours a night. 'I couldn't stop thinking. My body was exhausted, and my mind was still going.' UNSETTLING MUSIC I'd hear him foostering around outside in` in the living room or in the kitchen or whatever and say, 'Man, what are you doing up?' 'Shit, man, I can't sleep,' you know. In addition to the sleeping pill doxylamine, Heath turned to the Alexander technique, a discipline that focuses on posture. We would do Alexander technique,... you know, because it helps` it helps refocus, so you're not` you know, you're not spinning, you're not thinking. Then he could go back to sleep. But the autopsy reveals that even the additional help of the Alexander technique was not enough to help Heath conquer his sleeplessness. The toxicology report shows the presence of the powerful benzodiazepine temazepam. Temazepam is used to combat serious sleep disorder. By the time Heath finished the London filming on Doctor Parnassus, three days before his death, his insomnia was chronic. By now, Heath was hooked on the sleeping pills temazepam and doxylamine. I says, 'These` They're not working; they're not doing you any good.' You know, 'Stop taking them,' you know, and he says, 'Yeah, I know,' he says, 'but I'll` I'll get that sorted, now, once we get through` get to the end of this.' PHONE RINGS New York, the day before Heath Ledger is found dead. He's returned home after a punishing film schedule in London and catches up with his elder sister, Kate, in Australia. The conversation turns to Heath's use of prescription drugs. Before long, things get heated. What's worrying Kate is the amount of drugs he appears to be taking. I can see that toxicology tests reveal another drug in his system ` alprazolam, an anti-anxiety drug commonly known as Xanax. But Heath was already taking Valium to combat his anxiety. Heath is desperate to see his 2-year-old daughter, Matilda, but she is with her mother, his ex-girlfriend, Michelle Williams, who's on set in Sweden. POIGNANT MUSIC He loved his child; he missed her; he wanted to see her. That's stressful. That brings up a lot of anxiety. Ledger's anxiety continued to increase. He and Michelle are embroiled in a bitter custody battle over Matilda. Oh, he was worried about Matilda. Of course he was. I mean, she was the love of his love, and he was concerned. He was concerned about how his future relationship with Matilda would develop. New York for a celebrity can be a surprisingly lonely place. He was not someone known to do well with, uh, solitude in the first place, and this I can imagine just being almost intolerable. SOMBRE MUSIC From press descriptions of the scene, I can see that the drug Zoloft was found in his bedroom. Sertraline, known as Zoloft in the US, is an antidepressant drug and works by normalising chemical imbalances in the brain that cause depression. The split with Michelle and Matilda coincided with Heath filming his most challenging role ` The Joker in The Dark Knight. OMINOUS MUSIC I think doing The Joker must've been devastating for him, uh, internally. (EXHALES SHARPLY) For six weeks in the summer of 2007, Heath locked himself away, developing the character. An immersive actor, he decided The Joker must be a cold-blooded, mass murdering psychopath. He played the part to perfection. I knew Heath well enough to know that he could not do a part till he could bring himself to the part, and how much he must've dug inside himself to find that cruelty, and then to stay with that cruelty through his shoot and then to come out of that cruelty must've deeply affected his psychology. I don't think anybody could've played The Joker and come out of it without feeling,... uh, a sense of nervous tension that would stay with you for a while. When asked to comment on Heath's death, screen legend Jack Nicholson, who had played The Joker, made this chilling remark. REPORTER: Jack, any comments on Heath Ledger's death? I warned him. Nicholson's comment sparked speculation that the psychological impact of playing The Joker contributed to Heath's death. When you've been so immersed in a specific role, you need that psychological and that physical separation to get back to self, and if you don't do that, it can linger on, and some of those behaviours and those feelings can linger on in you for a long time afterwards. But Heath only had two weeks between wrapping The Dark Knight and starting what would be his last film. INDISTINCT CHATTER Bro. It's Pamela. SMOOTH MUSIC (SLURPS) # You know we get down with all the cyber moms. # One of them told me I was hot right now like Tiger Balm. # One of them said, 'Larz, you a teen heart-throb ` # 'make my baby faint; make a tween's heart stop.' # (GRUNTS, RETCHES) Ewww. He's a bit of a grossie, eh? (CHUCKLES SOFTLY) < (GRUNTS) Is that your friend? Him? (CHUCKLES) Nah. < (RETCHES) Ooh. (CHUCKLES) . CAR HORN TOOTS PHONE RINGS CAR HORN BLARES 16 hours before his death. Heath is at home alone and on the phone to his friend, film director Shekhar Kapur. We were about to announce a film together, and so I came to New York,... The pair have plans to meet up. ...and he said, 'Look, I'm really tired, jet-lagged, and so let's meet tomorrow morning.' I said fine, and he said, 'Call me and wake me up,' and I said OK. Exhausted from his gruelling schedule, suffering from anxiety, insomnia and depression, Heath is still struggling with the harsh reality of his split from Michelle Williams. He... He broke the relationship. POIGNANT MUSIC I wish he hadn't, but he did, and that conflict in him must've been very deep. He's very sensitive to hurting people. I think that Heath had the potential to feel a lot of guilt. I know that he did constantly feel like what's he done? Splitting up from a life partner, uh, people have described as being akin to a living bereavement, and add to that there is a child involved and you're not sure whether you're gonna see the child can also cause you to feel like, 'I've failed in my relationship,' and 'Am I going to fail here now as a parent as well?' And all these feelings can cause a person to feel depressed. With reports that the antidepressant drug Zoloft is found in his bedroom, had depression finally overwhelmed Heath Ledger? There were some suggestions that he was suicidal. That's absolute nonsense. He lived for that kid, lived for her, and that` and his career, and,... you know, everything about` everything about him was, 'Future, future, future,' you know, devel` you know, growing, expanding, being, doing what he dreamed of, you know. There was no way that was in his mind ` zero possibility of that. The one thing he was not at all was suicidal ` not at all. Not at all. I` That's one rumour I refuse to accept. Zoloft wasn't found in his system by the toxicologist. In fact, there was no evidence of any antidepressant, so the precise reason for his death remains a mystery. UNSETTLING MUSIC The day of Heath Ledger's death. PHONE RINGS He said, 'Call me at 9.30 to wake me up.' 9.30, I didn't wanna wake him up. 11.30, I called him. Nobody picked up the phone. PHONE RINGS LOW, TENSE MUSIC Heath's housekeeper, Teresa Solomon, arrives at his apartment. There's no sign of Heath, and his bedroom door is shut. On the fridge door is a note advising her of a 3pm massage appointment. WATER RUNS By 12.30pm, Heath's still not appeared. Needing to change a light bulb in his bathroom, she knocks on his door and enters. UNSETTLING MUSIC (SNORES) Hearing him snoring, Solomon leaves the room. Snoring may simply indicate that somebody's deeply asleep, but in certain circumstances, it can be an indicator of potentially fatal airway obstruction. TENSE MUSIC At 2.45pm, Heath's masseuse, Diana Wolozin, arrives. Huh? Oh, OK. Thank you. TENSE MUSIC BUILDS (SIGHS) At around 3.10pm, Wolozin knocks at Heath's door. Hello? He`? Heath? He doesn't respond. (DIALS PHONE NUMBER) She calls his phone, but it goes to voicemail. TENSE PERCUSSIVE MUSIC Wolozin later recounts to police what happens next. Heath? Assuming he's still asleep, she begins preparation for his massage. TENSE MUSIC BUILDS Heath still doesn't stir. Concerned, Wolozin tries to rouse him,... OMINOUS MUSIC Heath? ...but his body is cold to the touch. SOBS: Oh my God. No! My God! Oh jeez. OMINOUS MUSIC BUILDS Wolozin uses Heath's phone to ring his friend, actress Mary-Kate Olsen. Yeah, hi, it's... Heath has her name on speed dial. He's unconscious, but I` I dunno what to do. Heath can't be roused. Wolozin again calls Mary-Kate Olsen. No, I think he might be dead, yeah. No, I'm gonna call 911. Having rung Olsen a third time, at 3.24pm Wolozin finally calls 911. Well, I think he might be dead. SIREN WAILS Do I do anything else? An operator advises her on how to perform CPR. SIREN WAILS Six minutes later, paramedics arrive. They try to resuscitate him,... TENSE MUSIC DEFIBRILLATOR CHARGES UP THUD! DEFIBRILLATOR CHARGES UP, THUD! ...but at 3.36pm Heath Ledger is pronounced dead. INDISTINCT CHATTER Bro. It's Pamela. SMOOTH MUSIC (SLURPS) # You know we get down with all the cyber moms. # One of them told me I was hot right now like Tiger Balm. # One of them said, 'Larz, you a teen heart-throb ` # 'make my baby faint; make a tween's heart stop.' # (GRUNTS, RETCHES) Ewww. He's a bit of a grossie, eh? (CHUCKLES SOFTLY) < (GRUNTS) Is that your friend? Him? (CHUCKLES) Nah. < (RETCHES) Ooh. (CHUCKLES) I came to my friend's house, and he said, 'Sit down. I gotta say something to you,' and I said, 'What?' And he said, 'Heath Ledger just died.' I said, 'Oh, whatcha talking about?' And then I saw it on the news. We have breaking news, and i-it's shocking. Uh, um, being reported both by the Associated Press and by TMZ.com that the actor Heath Ledger has been found dead in his apartment in Manhattan. I still can't comprehend it. Why would it happen to somebody like that? This comes as extremely shocking news. Absolutely unexpected. There's absolutely no way that that was on the cards. This is something that definitely nobody saw coming. It was staggering. How could this`? How could it have happened? REPORTERS CLAMOUR, CAMERA SHUTTERS CLICK Next day, when Heath Ledger's autopsy is performed, the precise cause of death is unclear. Medical examiners said today there was no criminality. Of course, we have to wait for the toxology report. 10 days later, the medical examiner announces his conclusion ` Heath Ledger died from the abuse of prescription medication. When the medical examiner announced the toxicology results, he added, and` and I quote ` For me, this may underplay the role of two particular drugs in Heath's death ` two painkillers. The toxicology report showed the presence in his system of hydrocodone and oxycodone. Both drugs are strictly controlled in the US, and doctors are required to register all prescriptions of these drugs with the regulatory authorities, but following Heath's death, the Drug Enforcement Agency, the DEA, could not identify where Heath obtained the two painkillers. Two of the most lethal medications that were in his system were not prescribed to him. He got them from somebody else, and he got them illegally. The DEA wanted to question Heath's friend Mary-Kate Olsen. She asked for immunity from prosecution in return, but the enquiry was closed, and the mystery of who supplied the painkillers remains. The question in my mind is ` why was Heath was taking two illegally supplied painkillers? Hydrocodone ` a synthetic opioid often used orally as a cough suppressant. And we know that Heath had a bad cough and flu, but it's the presence of oxycodone, another synthetic opioid used in the treatment of severe pain, such as after surgery or in people with cancer, that perhaps may be even more significant. Given he had sourced oxycodone illegally, he may not have been using the drug for its intended purpose. Oxycodone can be used to get high. It has exactly the same effects as heroin and is very addictive. The important thing to remember is because a person is using this medication, doesn't mean they're having blast. People who become addicted to opiates or who use opiates and don't have pain ` physical pain ` do so because they're in pain. Oxycodone, like heroin, changes neurochemical activity in the brain where automatic body functions, such as breathing and heart rate, are controlled. It's dangerous, and that's why prescription is tightly regulated, and it should only be used under the strict supervision of a doctor. Exhausted from a punishing work schedule, chronically sleepless, suffering from a chest infection and with his personal life in turmoil, Heath was alone with his thoughts and a cocktail of legal and illegal prescription drugs. It's important that oxycodone and hydrocodone shouldn't be used with other drugs capable of supressing your central nervous system, but Heath had four other drugs in his system doing exactly that. (COUGHS) Heath's breathing was already compromised by a chest infection. Now a stew of sleeping pills, anti-anxiety drugs and painkillers were depressing his respiratory system even further. In combination, Heath's breathing would've become progressively more shallow until it stopped. Shortly afterwards, within a minute or two, his heart would've stopped, then his circulation would've stopped, and at that point, Heath would've died. Although the medical examiner didn't point to the abuse of any specific drug, there are obvious culprits. In my opinion, without the presence of oxycodone and hydrocodone in his system, it's possible that Heath might have survived. To me, Heath's death wasn't intentional; it was a tragic accident, but what Heath's death does bring home to us is the dangers of abusing prescription medications. CAMERA SHUTTERS CLICK Heath Ledger's body was taken home to Australia, and the world mourned the loss of a great talent. In 2009 his family collected a posthumous Best Supporting Actor Oscar for Heath's mesmerising portrayal of The Joker. He was an extraordinary young man and an extraordinary young actor who'll be missed. I mean, look at his performances ` stunning. Sometimes he was so present that there was only one person in the film. He was on the cusp of taking acting to another completely new level. He would've done some amazing things. He would've redefined what a Hollywood star does.