SIREN WAILS Somebody's passed out. Please get here quickly, Please. OPERATOR: Oh, OK. O` Actress and singer Brittany Murphy ` best known for her portrayal of Eminem's girlfriend, Alex, in the film 8 Mile and Alicia Silverstone's funny, frumpy friend in the cult film Clueless ` has been found lying unconscious in the bathroom of her Hollywood home. Is she awake? No! Is she breathing? No! SIREN WAILS Paramedics rush Brittany to the nearest hospital, but at 10.05, she is pronounced dead. She is just 32 years old. Hollywood is mourning the death of one of its own. 32-year-old actress Brittany Murphy died Sunday morning after paramedics were called to her Los Angeles home. In the weeks and months following Brittany's death, the Hollywood rumour mill went into overdrive. There were claims that Brittany had died from anorexia, a drugs overdose, and even that she'd been murdered. Right now, we don't have any evidence that she was on drugs, but there's a lot of speculation about it. She's been transported to our office. We'll be conducting an autopsy. The fascinating thing about autopsies is that they're a search for the facts, and whether or not the person is a celebrity, like Brittany Murphy, has no bearing at all. There are no celebrities on the mortuary slab. Copyright Able 2015 TENSE MUSIC World-renowned forensic pathologist Dr Richard Shepherd has been conducting high-profile autopsies for more than 25 years. This the post-mortem report of Brittany Murphy, and if you know how to read it, it pretty much tells you the whole story of her life, but in particular, the days and hours leading up to her death. But what makes this case particularly unusual is the fact that I'm investigating not just one death, but two, because her husband died approximately five months later on of the same thing. TENSE MUSIC Thursday 17th of December 2009, Los Angeles, California. Brittany is at the Hollywood home she shares with her husband, Simon Monjack, and mother, Sharon Murphy. Brittany is suffering from a virus which has given her a nasty cough. In recent years, the Hollywood starlet's career has been on the slide. Reports of odd behaviour and recurrent health issues on set have damaged her reputation. Brittany has just returned from a film set in Puerto Rico, where her strange behaviour led to creative differences with the producers, and she left the movie early. It seems most likely that Brittany got a viral infection on her trip to Puerto Rico which gave her flu-like symptoms, with a cough and ache and feeling generally unwell. However, at this stage, there wasn't too much to worry about. The flu-like symptoms have been bothering Brittany for over a week. She has problems breathing and tightness in her chest for which she's been taking a variety of medicines to help to ease the symptoms. There's a good girl. That's it. OK. MAN: That's it. Good. Since Brittany was 2 years old, her mother had brought her up on her own. Angelo Bertolotti, her father, was a doting dad, but had left the family home. She was a loving, uh, giving person. I mean, she just was, uh, absolutely perfect, and that's just not admiring her for being her father. She was a great girl, kind to everybody. Brittany's Hollywood career started when she was just 13, with parts in various sitcoms and commercials,... but it was her portrayal of the funny, frumpy girl next door, Tai, in the 1995 cult teen comedy Clueless that really got her noticed. She was the most wonderful actress ` incredible actress ` and she had a way of being able to get inside a character that I don't think people realise how amazing she would've been and was. She was amazing ` an amazing, beautiful, wonderful, bright star. In her bid for stardom over the next seven years, she would undergo an astonishing transformation. REPORTERS CLAMOUR > Go for it, baby! > Brittany looked so different that it fuelled rumours that she was either taking illegal drugs or suffering from anorexia. I think the reason that we saw the change in Brittany after Clueless was that she knew, to step up her game, she had to transform herself in some way. So becoming this larger-than-life vamp was gonna land her those bigger roles, those just-out-of-reach main starring roles. Because the change in Brittany was so dramatic, people started questioning her body image, saying, 'Has she become anorexic? Where's it gone? 'All that puppy fat ` it seems to have disappeared. What's she done to herself?' Based on the information in her autopsy report, there's no signs of any eating disorder. She weighed 115 pounds, which is 8 stone 3, which is a perfectly healthy weight for someone who was 5'5" in height. An autopsy report said that she was 'slim, normally muscular and not excessively thin'. TENSE MUSIC Through her film career, she was also dogged with allegations of cocaine use, but after her death, her mother, Sharon, was adamant that there was no truth in the rumours. She was diagnosed with a heart murmur when she was, um, a young teenager, and she was terrified of anything... happening to her. She never did any drugs,... ever. From the toxicology report, it's clear there's no evidence of cocaine in Brittany's system. And the autopsy shows that, in fact, there was nothing at all wrong with Brittany's heart. It was entirely normal, and so a cardiac cause of death hasn't played any part. Let's sit down together. (COUGHS) Thursday 17th December 2009. Brittany is still feeling weak. Her chest is tight, and she wants something to help her breathe more easily. (COUGHS) The report does throw up the possibility of another illegal compound present in her bloodstream ` methamphetamine ` that looks as though she's been using illegal drugs. Crystal meth is a highly addictive illegal drug. Over the last 10 years, there have been a number of deaths linked to its use. If Brittany was using crystal meth, it could've been a contributing factor to her death. The type of methamphetamine found in Brittany's system is not from the streets. It's from an asthmatic's puffer. It only opens up the air passages. So Brittany has not been taking any illegal drugs. (BREATHES HEAVILY) But Brittany was not asthmatic and had never been prescribed an inhaler. I was watching her, Simon. I didn't see her take your medication. Hey. Hey, what are you doing? You shouldn't be taking this. This is mine. Her autopsy reveals that she had been taking other prescription medication not prescribed to her. What's truly amazing about Brittany Murphy's autopsy is the incredible number of prescription drugs that were found in her system ` half of which weren't prescribed to her. Her original toxicology report reveals 14 different drugs. And on top of that, I have a further report that lists another 10 chemicals. Taken together, her autopsy report and the two toxicology reports are truly astonishing. Eddie Bubar was Brittany's local pharmacist and regularly supplied some of her medication. I said, 'I'm really concerned that there is way too much medication in your residence.' I basically said to her, 'I think you have more than I do, and I own the pharmacy.' On the 20th of December 2009, Hollywood starlet Brittany Murphy died in hospital in Los Angeles. The world was shocked by the sudden passing of such a young star. She was just 32. Following her death, rumours circulated that she had died of a drugs overdose, an eating disorder and even murder. Yet the actual cause of her death remained a mystery. Now world-renowned pathologist Dr Richard Shepherd pieces together the secrets of the last days of her life from the autopsy and toxicology reports. Brittany Murphy's very detailed autopsy report enables you to have a really good insight into her life and the days and hours before her death. We know that she was suffering from a very mild chest infection. She didn't have any signs of an eating disorder. There was no evidence that she used any illegal substances. But actually, her original toxicology report reveals 14 different drugs in her system ` half of which weren't prescribed to her. POIGNANT MUSIC Friday 18th December, late afternoon. Brittany is at the home she shares with her mother, Sharon, and her husband, Simon. After nearly a week of self-medicating using cough medicines and her husband's inhaler, she is still exhausted and can't move far from her bed. Her cough is getting worse, and she is finding breathing difficult, but she does call the doctor and makes an appointment for Monday ` two days later. (BREATHES HEAVILY) Doctor? It's Brittany. It's an appointment she will never keep. (GROANS) (COUGHS) 1 TENSE MUSIC (SIGHS) BEEPING, INDISTINCT SPEECH LOUD CLANGING CLATTERING CAR ALARM CHIRPS TENSE MUSIC 1 The autopsy report shows that one of the strongest, most worrying drugs that Brittany was taking was a drug called hydrocodone. Hydrocodone is one of a group of opiate-based analgesics. This is a very powerful painkilling drug that's linked to the same group as heroin and has its effect directly on the brain to control pain. Because of its links with heroin, it can be highly addictive. Hydrocodone is normally only prescribed as pain relief to people who have suffered a major trauma. According to friends and family, in 1995, Brittany did suffer a traumatic incident, which at the time, went unreported. Shortly after the release of Clueless, she did have a car accident. It wasn't just a minor fender bender. It was pretty serious. She did nearly die, and, uh, she did have, after that, a lot of terrible back pain. She suffered a dislocated jaw, a broken collarbone and, from what I recall, a couple of cracked ribs. She was in a lot of pain, and that was the beginning of her getting on pain medication. She felt that she was in so much pain, she couldn't cope without them. This became her modus operandi. 'Without drugs, I feel too much pain. I need it to survive.' If Brittany did damage her jaw and her back in an accident 14 years previously, it's not something that would've been seen at the post-mortem examination. However, it might've been a reason for her to be given very strong painkilling drugs at the time of the accident, and it's not unusual for the exposure to those drugs to be the start of an addiction. Hi, guys. BRITTANY COUGHS > Hey. It's almost midnight ` just 10 hours before Brittany's death ` and her cough seems to be getting worse. Brittany is now also in agony from menstrual cramps. Good girl. OK, I'm gonna give you some water. The autopsy shows hydrocodone is not the only serious drug that she got hold of before she died; it also reveals other inappropriate medicines. She was also taking two anti-epileptic drugs ` Klonopin and Topomax ` even though she'd never been diagnosed as having epilepsy. Klonopin and Topomax are anti-seizure drugs that help control epileptics from fitting. They work by inhibiting the nervous system. Brittany has also been taking a drug normally only prescribed to people with heart conditions ` propranolol. Propranolol is a drug that's used to treat heart disease, particularly high blood pressure. Brittany hadn't been prescribed the drug, and yet it was found in her bloodstream. So where was Brittany getting these medicines from? And why was she taking them? At the time, Brittany's husband, Simon Monjack's health was in decline. He had many different forms of natural disease. He had significant heart disease. He had significant liver disease. There was also evidence of neurological disease and a whole series of other diseases as well. He was also epileptic, and for all these diseases, he was taking various drugs. So he too was taking numerous drugs of different types ` many of them prescribed to him, some of them prescribed to other people. Well, when Simon and Brittany first got together, um, it was quite a shock. The couple married in 2007. The press was stunned. After all, Brittany was the former girlfriend of Ashton Kutcher and Eminem. So what did this little-known British screenwriter and photographer seven years Brittany's senior have that helped him captured the heart of a rising Hollywood star? Simon was very insecure, always was, and Brittany was very very insecure. So somehow, they managed to offset each of their insecurities together and become a cohesive whole. She absolutely adored him. If you look at pictures of when they was first together, he was really a very good-looking guy. He looked great. He was handsome. And then because things happened and he became quite bloated even before she died, and she still loved him ` she loved the person. Brittany and Simon shared everything. So could she have been taking the other prescription drugs in their home? TENSE MUSIC Sunday, 1am. Brittany has fallen into a deep sleep. Her mother and husband, on the bed beside her, are relieved that she is finally getting some rest. The toxicology report lists another drug ` Diazepam, known as Valium, which is very common antidepressant, anti-anxiety drug which has a significant sedative effect as well. But in addition to that, she was also taking three other benzodiazepine drugs. It's very unusual to take four types of the same drug, and the combination of these four together strongly suggests a benzodiazepine addiction. Brittany has never been prescribed benzodiazepines ` it appears that she had been taking someone else's medicine. Eddie Bubar was the pharmacist who supplied medication to the Murphy-Monjack house. I became involved in Brittany's life by first starting to fill medications for her mother, Sharon Murphy, round 2007, and then she had asked if we could then fill prescriptions for her daughter. Sharon wasn't just ordering medication for herself; she was using pseudonyms to obtain medications for her daughter. I think it's done amongst high-profile people or people who want anonymity ` to use an alias of some kind ` but the` the name of Lola was used very frequently. The house was now full of prescription medication in a number of different names. Sharon used the name Lola Manilow to order Brittany's medications ` Brittany, aka Lola. We were starting to believe that there could be a potential for abuse. In Hollywood, it can be quite common for people to go shopping for their prescription drugs from more than one pharmacy, And it actually came to light that Sharon had been going to up to six different outlets to collect prescription drugs for Brittany, Simon and herself. But despite all this being common practice in Hollywood, Eddie was worried. My gut was that s` something was gonna happen. TENSE MUSIC Somewhere along the line, being given prescription drugs, you can trick yourself into saying, 'Well, that's OK. It's not an illegal drug, it is prescribed, so I'm safe having it,' but any drug you put into your body has side effects and can potentially have devastating side effects if you overmedicate. Her mother used to take medication all the time, and I think that it was just a culture that she grew up with, and there was no fear in taking prescription medication. POIGNANT MUSIC Sharon was a constant presence in her daughter's life. She helped her with everything, including the decisions she made in her career. Mother and daughter were inseparable. She was on set. She was everywhere that Brittany was, and, now, to be far to Sharon, that's what Brittany wanted. In this very enmeshed relationship between Brittany and her mum, it almost felt like you don't know where one stopped and the other began, because Brittany's mum then took on the role of being her momager, and that is a very complex relationship where you've got the mother-daughter relationship, which should be about unconditional love, and the manager bit, which is about making money from the brand. In 2003, following the success of 8 Mile and Clueless, Brittany splashed out just under $4 million on 1895 Rising Glen Rd,... buying the house of her dreams from Britney Spears. In 2007, when Brittany and Simon married after a whirlwind romance, he too moved into Rising Glen Rd, seemingly happy to be moving in with both his wife and his mother-in-law. What was very strange, really, when Brittany became older and actually got into a relationship with Simon and actually married him, Mum didn't move out of the house ` she stayed there. So there was this bizarre triangle that existed in their lives where it is 'me, my husband, and my mum.' He made that decision to fit into their dynamic, to belong to them, so what happened is the three of them belonged to each other. So he was swallowed in as part of this dependency dynamic that was going on between Brittany and Sharon. And within weeks, the family of three became increasingly reclusive. They were terrible, terrible hoarders. UNSETTLING MUSIC Her clothes were everywhere. MUSIC CONTINUES The dining room was completely banked with their clothes. MUSIC CONTINUES Rail upon rail upon rail upon rail of their clothes. There was things piling out of cupboards everywhere. UNSETTLING MUSIC CONTINUES As well as being surrounded by clutter, some of the windows were sealed up. When I walked through the door, there was no air ventilation whatsoever. The, uh, windows were breaking down from mould. (COUGHS) This was a place of... unhealthiness. It didn't feel... right. (COUGHS, BREATHES HEAVILY) TENSE MUSIC (COUGHS) It's around 3 o'clock on Sunday morning. Brittany is gasping for breath and needs to get out of the airless bedroom. (COUGHS) The cocktail of benzodiazepines and anti-seizure medication has left her feeling incredibly sedated. She heads outside to try and get some fresh air into her clogged lungs. (COUGHS) Brittany collapses. She's now really struggling to breathe. The increasing shortness of breath is really significant because it shows that her chest infection was getting worse, and Brittany really needed proper medical help at this time or there was a chance that she was going to die. But Brittany decides not to call 911. So what was it that caused her death? Brittany's father has his own theory. Fact is she was poisoned. That was it. TENSE MUSIC Dr Richard Shepherd, one of Britain's leading pathologists, has been analysing the autopsy of the Hollywood starlet Brittany Murphy. What's truly amazing about Brittany Murphy's autopsy is the incredible number of prescription drugs that were found in her system ` half of which weren't prescribed to her. UNSETTLING MUSIC Approximately 3am, Sunday the 20th of December 2009. Brittany staggers from her bedroom on to the balcony, struggling to breathe. She almost certainly needs a doctor, but Simon doesn't call for one. Brittany was so sedated that it's quite possible that neither Simon nor Sharon had any idea how ill she actually was. And that may be the reason why they didn't call an ambulance. And over the previous months, Brittany regularly claimed to be ill. It was quite obvious from what she used to say that she was, you know, fearful of death, that, you know, 'Am I OK? Am I OK? Am I all right?' Anything, any illness that she had was always magnified, always very intense. 'I'm ill' would've been a key part of her identity and how she saw herself. Being diagnosed with a heart murmur very young may have encouraged Brittany to develop an identity and a set of core beliefs that 'I am fragile and I need to be taken care of. I am weak and vulnerable in some way.' With rumours circulating about her ill health, it's also possible that Brittany didn't want to call an ambulance, because she was fearful that if the paparazzi got hold of the story, this could damage her career even further. They were very reclusive. They were very fearful of, um, what they said were the paparazzi; very fearful of the paparazzi. Somehow, it all seemed to be part of the Hollywood scene. But fear of the paparazzi wasn't the only reason why Brittany wanted to maintain her privacy. Over the last couple of years, she had become increasingly convinced that they were being watched ` something she confided to friends and family. I was in Las Vegas at the time it happened, and, uh, I got a call about 4 o'clock in the morning from her that she was being watched. Uh, the last two days, you know, somebody was, like, stalking her. They would say that there was, um, helicopters flying overheard, that they were being watched, they were under surveillance. Both of them were very fearful of this. And to get into the house,... you have to put your thumb here. CLICK! BEEP! Their house was like Fort Knox. They had surveillance cameras all over the house, and they had a security guard there 24 hours. The security was mad ` totally, completely raving mad. It seemed to me to be way, way over the top, and there was` because they were frightened. Brittany's father, Angelo, convinced himself that this was part of a conspiracy and the suspected surveillance had something to do with Brittany's role in a complex case involving a family friend. I became a whistle-blower about, um, inadequate procedures that were being used to admit people from terrorist countries into the United States, and this information was, um, very damaging. In 2008, Brittany's friend Julia Davis, a customs and border protection officer, lifted the lid on a scandal involving her employer, the Department of Homeland Security. In evidence in court, Julia said that Homeland Security was targeting herself, her family and friends through an extreme campaign of harassment and intimidation by the authorities. My family and I were under, uh, constant surveillance, including airplanes, fixed-wing airplanes and Black Hawk helicopters and people following us in vehicles. In, uh, February, Brittany was set to appear as a witness on my behalf in my case. And Julia's conspiracy theory didn't stop there. So because, um, of her participation, Brittany and Simon also became targeted by Homeland Security. This seems odd, as Brittany was only appearing at Julia's trial as a minor witness, but Julia and Angelo believe the case may have been the key to her death. The, uh, coroner's department did not, uh, do a full examination. What they really did was just sweep it under the carpet. Brittany's dad and I would, uh, read all the symptoms Brittany was suffering. Um, it sounded more like poisoning. Angelo and Julia believe that the symptoms Brittany was exhibiting ` vomiting, abdominal pains and difficulty breathing ` were those of someone who had been deliberately poisoned. Angelo requested a new toxicology report that specifically looked for poisons in his daughter's hair. The results were potentially extraordinary. I have here the toxicology report that was requested by Brittany Murphy's father. Superficially, it's really quite scaring. There's silver, there's arsenic, there's beryllium ` there's a number of heavy metals which are commonly present in the body in trace amounts, but in this report, it shows that it in the hair, they're present in high amounts. Angelo maintains that the high levels of these heavy metals prove that Brittany was poisoned. We had some, uh, very prominent doctors on this case, and, uh,... she was poisoned. If Brittany had been poisoned by significant qualities of heavy metals, I would've expected there to have been signs and symptoms present in the original coroner's autopsy report. Heavy metal poisoning results in a whole constellation of symptoms, including blotchy skin, loose teeth and bone marrow suppression, which causes anaemia. Brittany's skin and teeth were normal. However, the autopsy report did show evidence of anaemia. Could this on its own prove that she was poisoned? Tests done after Brittany's death show that she suffered from severe anaemia. In fact, her red cell count was 75% lower than it should've been. So was this a sign of bone marrow poisoning? In fact, the autopsy report says that Brittany suffered from prolonged, heavy periods, and that's the commonest cause for anaemia in women of this age. So we have a reason to explain her low red cell count and her anaemia, and that was her periods and not the poisoning. So why were all these toxic chemicals showing up in the toxicology report ordered by her father? One explanation for the presence of these heavy metals within the hair is that these are chemicals that have the most colourful compounds within the periodic table, and it's likely that were used within dyeing materials that were placed on Brittany's hair to give her the correct colours, and so it's possible that all of these heavy metals are simple contaminants caused by hair dyes. So on the base of complete absence of any signs and symptoms in Brittany's first post-mortem examination, we have to dismiss this report completely. UNSETTLING MUSIC TENSE MUSIC 7.30 on Sunday morning, and Brittany staggers into the bathroom, vomiting heavily. She can hardly breathe and has a fever. (BREATHES HEAVILY) She asks her mother for a hug and passes out in her arms. She's passed out. Simon! Come help. What happened? She just passed out. (SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY) Brittany. Brittany. Simon tries to rouse her, but Brittany is unresponsive. So he tries to revive her under the shower,... TENSE MUSIC CONTINUES ...but Brittany remains unconscious. Sharon calls for an ambulance. The 911 operator talks Simon and Sharon through performing CPR on Brittany. OPERATOR: I'm gonna give you instructions. Are you right by her now? Yes. OK, look inside her mouth and check for food or vomit. She just threw up tons of stuff. Is there`? She's` She's` They're doing` doing mouth-to-mouth. Please, is someone coming? OK. We're gonna send somebody out there, OK? Is she awake? Please. No! Is she breathing? No! Somebody's doing mouth-to-mouth? SOBS: Yes. TENSE MUSIC When paramedics arrive nine minutes later at 8.09, they struggle to find a pulse. So they too attempt CPR. Brittany. PARAMEDIC: Still quite faint. With no vital signs, they rush Brittany to hospital. At 8.38, she arrives in the emergency room in full cardiac arrest. Resuscitation attempts prove futile. TENSE MUSIC CONTINUES Brittany Anne Murphy-Monjack is pronounced dead at 10.05 on the 20th of December 2009. Hollywood is mourning the death of one of its own. 32-year-old actress Brittany Murphy died Sunday morning, after paramedics were called to her Los Angeles home. Was I surprised that something happened there? I don't think so. Yesterday morning, uh, Brittany Murphy was brought here to Cedars-Sinai Medical Centre after her mother found her unconscious in her be` in her, uh, bathroom. We're conducting an investigation into the death of Brittany Murphy. Uh, it appears to be natural at this time. When I heard of Brittany's death, my, uh, first reaction was, uh, uh, completely shock. When I got news she died, I just packed a bag and came. How are you holding up? I don't think I am. (SOBS) I don't think either of us are. No. You know, you just never dreamed that` You know, I always thought it would be me, not her. (SOBS) CAMERA SHUTTER CLICKS As soon as Brittany died, the rumours started. Some newspapers ran headlines listing the prescription medications that were found in Brittany's home, but were these enough to kill her? We know Brittany had developed a chest infection, but the autopsy reveals she wasn't poisoned, as her father suggested. But what fuelled speculation further was that in five months' time, her husband, Simon Monjack, would also die from the same symptoms. TENSE MUSIC Brittany Murphy was pronounced dead at a Hollywood hospital at 10.05 on the 20th of December 2009. OXYGEN PUFFS Dr Richard Shepherd's thorough investigation into Brittany's autopsy has established that the Hollywood starlet had an astonishing 14 different prescription medications in her system ` a cocktail of chemicals which mixed anti-anxiety medicine with antidepressants and anti-seizure medication, and on top of all of these, there was cough medication and painkillers. Drugs can have a very beneficial effect, but they will also have side effects, and mixing them together means that these side effects can often combine and become lethal. The medical evidence shows Brittany was battling a chest infection, but the press speculated that she had died from a drug-induced heart attack. The autopsy shows that, in fact, there was nothing at all wrong with Brittany's heart, and Brittany has not been taking any illegal drugs. Brittany's father, Angelo, believes she had been poisoned. All of these heavy metals are simple contaminants caused by hair dyes. Another theory put forward by Brittany's mother, Sharon, linked her death to the mould that was present in the house when they bought it. (BREATHES HEAVILY) The autopsy report shows that pathologists actually looked for the fungi that are found in mould. The actual bedroom itself, that they both spent so much time, the... the actual windows were taped up. So there was no air ventilation whatsoever. The mould that was growing up by the windows was really quite horrific, and it just felt very oppressive, as if this was a place of... unhealthiness. The autopsy report shows that they didn't find any fungi, either in her bloodstream or in the sections of lung that they examined under the microscope. So mould and fungi haven't played a direct role in the death of Brittany, but living in poor housing conditions like that, it's likely to have had a debilitating effect and contributed to her infection and death. This would explain Brittany's breathlessness as she went out on to the balcony ` she was gasping for air and trying to cough up the bacteria in her system. But was it Brittany's chest infection that killed her? (COUGHS, WHEEZES) We know that there was a cocktail of drugs in Brittany's bloodstream. There were the four benzodiazepines, and add to those the two anti-seizure drugs. Together, these drugs can critically reduce the body's ability to oxygenate the blood, and at high levels, they can combine together to stop respiration. But none of these drugs either singly or combined are likely to have been the cause of her death. However, the poor conditions which Brittany chose to live in clearly weakened her system, but did not kill her. Tests that were performed at the autopsy show that the bacterium that had got into Brittany's lungs was one called Staphylococcus aureus. This is normally a bacterium that's commonly found on the skin. It's present in our noses and in our ears almost all of the time and causes no problems. It's also the bacterium that causes pus-y spots in acne. It seems most likely that the progression here was that Brittany got a viral infection which damaged the lining of her air passages and into her lungs, and that's allowed the Staphylococcus that is so commonly present on everyone to enter into the lungs and cause the severe pneumonia. It has a number of effects. It causes micro abscesses in the lungs, and because of the infection and inflammation, the lungs can't be involved in exchanging oxygen, which means people become short of breath and distressed, and they cough up ` or they could cough up ` a lot of purulent mucus. SOMBRE MUSIC Of course, we know there are other factors that were affecting her. She has a severe, acute chest infection, and she's apparently living in appalling conditions. (COUGHS) But crucially, Dr Shepherd has discovered that Brittany was unable to cough up the mucus that lay festering in her chest. The autopsy report shows that Brittany was taking cough medication. Cough medication is designed to stop you coughing so that you feel better, but actually, it also stops you bringing up the mucus and the bacteria out of your lung, and so it tends to make pneumonias worse. Combined with the sedatives she was taking, the two would work together to mean that although Brittany was perhaps coughing, she wasn't coughing enough or sufficiently forcefully to clear the mucus and the pus and the bacteria from her lungs. The bacteria multiply faster and faster within that soup-like material, and the infection progresses to a point where it becomes overwhelming. The multiplying virulent bacteria were attacking her system from within. She had all the mucus in her chest but was unable to shift it, and that's allowed the chest infection to develop to a point where it was so severe it was going to cause her death. Brittany went into septic shock, sending her blood pressure plummeting. Blood flow slowed around her body, reducing the level of oxygen in her system. The blood test taken at the autopsy showed that Brittany had septicaemia. That's blood poisoning, and the blood poisoning was caused by the Staphylococcus aureus ` the bacterium that was present in her lung, causing the chest infection. (VOMITS, COUGHS) So by the time Brittany actually collapsed in her bathroom, there was probably nothing that the paramedics or hospital staff could've done to save her. But had she been taken to hospital 24 hours earlier and given intravenous antibiotics, there's a very good chance that she would've survived and been with us today. Bacterial poisoning is a fairly common cause of death, but what made speculation round Brittany's death reach fever pitch was when her husband died of exactly the same thing just five months later. I started by saying that Brittany's death was one of two cases. Following Brittany's death, Simon continued living at 1895 Rising Glen Dr with his mother-in-law, Sharon. The house remained cluttered, and Simon continued to take a vast array of prescription pills for his many illnesses ` some prescribed to him, some not. You wake up in the morning, and it's like a rebirth. You wake up and I reach out to touch or hold my wife, and she isn't there. Between the time that Brittany died and the time he himself died, that five months, I saw a... an enormous change in him. He was getting more and more debilitated and ill. I looked at him about four weeks before he died, and I... I just looked at dead eyes. There was just nothing there. 23rd of May 2010. I phoned Simon, and he was not well at all, and I was really worried, really really worried at this time. Anyway, next time I phoned, I got Sharon, and I said to Sharon, 'I'm really concerned, Sharon. 'I think he's really really ill, 'and I want you to get 911 or ring a hospital because,' I said, 'I'm really concerned.' 'No, no, he's fine. He's fine. We don't want any paparazzi here.' Nevertheless, a few hours later, Sharon did call 911. But by the time the paramedics got there, Simon was already dead. Three hours later, she phoned me, tearfully telling me he had died. It's a very sad day for, uh, Ms Murphy. Uh, in less than six months, she has, uh, suffered a double loss. When an autopsy was performed on his body, it was discovered that he too had died from the same bacterial infection as Brittany. Simon was an extremely unwell man. I have his autopsy report here. He too was taking numerous drugs of different types. Many people who knew Simon couldn't believe that it was a coincidence. When Simon died, it was just too coincidental ` two people passing away... in the same place, the same condition. It is mathematically impossible for two people to die of the same exact death. I mean, that's almost impossible. For Dr Shepherd, though, there is nothing strange about his death at all. Two people dying of the same disease is unusual; two people with very similar lifestyles is much less so. The combination of a cocktail of prescription drugs, chest infection and the environment they chose to live in led, without question, to the death of this loving couple. DRAMATIC MUSIC Captions by Shrutika Gunanayagam. Edited by Faith Hamblyn. www.able.co.nz Captions were made possible with funding from NZ On Air. Copyright Able 2015