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Topic: Death at Phil Spector's Home Ruled a Homicide (Read 150 times)

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Death at Phil Spector's Home Ruled a Homicide
« on: Sep 23^rd, 2003, 9:57am »

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Death at Phil Spector's Home Ruled a Homicide
Mon Sep 22, 7:16 PM ET
By Dan Whitcomb

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - After an eight-month investigation, Los Angeles coroner's officials ruled on Monday that the shooting death of a woman at legendary music producer Phil Spector's home last February was a homicide.

The findings contradict claims by Spector that B-movie actress Lana Clarkson, 40, committed a bizarre suicide after "kissing" the gun and come as prosecutors weigh possible charges against him.

"The manner of death was homicide and the cause of death was a gunshot wound to the head and neck," Los Angeles County Coroner's spokesman David Campbell said. "How the injury occurred was she was shot by another person." There has been no evidence so far that anyone was in the house besides Clarkson and Spector at the time of the shooting.

Campbell said the report was sealed at the request of prosecutors, who were expected to decide this week what charges, if any, Spector should face in Clarkson's death.

Campbell added that coroner's officials based their decision on an autopsy of Clarkson's body as well as a long investigation by police into the circumstances of her Feb. 3 death.

Spector's attorney could not immediately be reached for comment on the report.

The body of Clarkson, who starred in such films as "Amazon Women on the Moon" and "The Barbarian Queen," was found in a pool of blood in the marble foyer of Spector's 33-room mock castle hours after she accompanied him home from the Sunset Strip nightclub where she had been working.

'SHE KISSED THE GUN'

The 62-year-old rock producer, known for his "Wall of Sound" recording technique, was arrested at the scene on suspicion of murder but quickly freed on $1 million bail. Since then, circumstances of Clarkson's death have remained murky.

Spector touched off a furor in June by telling Esquire Magazine that Clarkson killed herself by putting a gun in her mouth and blowing her head off, details about the incident that he apparently had not shared with police.

"She kissed the gun, I have no idea why," Spector told the magazine. "I never knew her, I never even saw her before that night ... I have no idea who she was or what her agenda was."

Spector also said in the article that Clarkson was "loud and drunk" on tequila at the House of Blues, where they met, and had asked him for a ride, adding that if police were able to make a case against him "I'd be sitting in jail right now."

Campbell said coroner's officials had conducted toxicology tests on Clarkson's body to determine what, if any, drugs and alcohol were in her system but had not released those results.

Spector was just 17 when he wrote and produced his first No. 1 hit, "To Know Him Is To Love Him" -- a line taken from the inscription on his father's gravestone -- for his high school group, the Teddy Bears. The teen tycoon would go on to produce 17 top-10 U.S. hits in a decade.

He helped out the Beatles in 1970 on their "Let It Be" album -- controversially putting lavish overdubs on such songs as "The Long and Winding Road" and "Across the Universe" -- then worked with George Harrison on his "All Things Must Pass" album and the "Concert for Bangladesh" project and with John Lennon on such songs as "Instant Karma" and "Imagine."

But Spector's output was overshadowed during the 1970s by tales of his dark side -- a messy divorce from second wife Ronnie Spector of the Ronettes and gunshots in the studio -- and in recent years he had become reclusive.

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