The young coroner had to do a double-take when he read the note waiting for him as he arrived for work that Sunday.
His first task of the day was to perform the autopsy of a woman who had died just a few hours earlier.
The sense of urgency was surprising enough – there were already several bodies waiting in the queue that should have taken priority. But it was her name that stopped him in his tracks.
Surely this wasn’t the Marilyn Monroe, the legendary beauty who had just purred happy birthday to the president at Madison Square Garden two months earlier?
Thomas Noguchi was one of the newest deputy coroners working in Los Angeles County in August 1962 when he was tasked with establishing the cause of death in a case that – 64 years on – is still shrouded in mystery and beset by conspiracy theories.
Now, aged 98, he has finally revealed what really happened to Marilyn, the regrets that haunt him and his lingering uncertainty over the finding that she died by suicide.
In the book LA Coroner by Anne Soon Choi, he describes reading the investigator’s report on the morning that was to change his life.
‘White female. Blue eyes. 5’4’, 115 pounds. Numerous bottles of pills were found scattered on a bedside table, including an empty bottle of Nembutal – sleeping pills – and a partially empty bottle of chloral hydrate, a powerful sedative.
Seeing the name Marilyn Monroe on the notes stopped Noguchi in his tracks
Thomas Noguchi was one of the newest deputy coroners working in Los Angeles County when he was tasked with establishing Marilyn Monroe’s cause of death
Numerous bottles of pills were found scattered on Marilyn’s bedside table, including an empty bottle of Nembutal – sleeping pills
She was found nude, lying face down, her hand outstretched and resting on the phone.
In the ‘Additional Information’ section of the report, Noguchi learned that Monroe had been given a prescription for Nembutal two days earlier, and that she had spoken to her psychiatrist just one day before her death when she was ‘very despondent.’
‘It was straightforward,’ Noguchi told the author. ‘But an autopsy would need to be done to confirm the death.’
Marilyn was 36 when she died – just a year older than Noguchi at the time – a fact that made him feel strangely connected to the woman on the table.
He pulled back the sheet and began by examining every inch of Marilyn’s body with a magnifying glass, searching for any needle marks that might be evidence she’d been injected with drugs.
‘He checked the usual spots: the crook of the elbow, the upper thigh, in the webbing of the fingers and toes,’ writes Choi. ‘He found none.
‘He pushed aside her platinum blond hair to examine her scalp. Nothing.’
Turning her over, he continued his search on her back. It was clear.
‘After turning her right side up, he turned to a tray of tools, picked up a scalpel, and began the familiar Y-incision.’
Examining her stomach and small intestine, there was no visual evidence of pills.
This was a surprise, he told Choi, considering the prescription bottles that had been found by her bedside.
Marilyn was found nude, lying face down on her bed, her hand outstretched and resting on the phone
An ambulance team takes the body of Marilyn Monroe out of her Brentwood home
‘He carefully removed and weighed the organs for the physical autopsy report. He noted that the gallbladder was missing, which explained the scar on her abdomen.’
Marilyn had gallbladder surgery the year before.
Noguchi collected various samples for toxicology testing: blood, urine, liver, kidneys, her stomach and its contents, and intestines.
His assistant then sutured the incision closed and covered Marilyn back up with the sheet. They would now have to wait for the lab results.
Noguchi felt sure he already knew the star’s cause of death. ‘It was plain and simple,’ writes Choi. ‘She had died of an overdose of sleeping pills.
‘A routine suicide,’ Noguchi told her.
But when the toxicology results arrived on his desk later, ‘alarm bells went off in his head.’
The head toxicologist, Raymond Abernathy, after finding fatal levels of pentobarbital and chloral hydrate in Marilyn’s system had decided it was pointless to run additional tests on the stomach and other organs.
‘A wave of anxiety washed over [Noguchi],’ writes Choi. ‘He knew that not running the additional tests would become a problem for him. It left too many questions unanswered, and ultimately, as the pathologist who conducted the physical autopsy, he would be held responsible.’
But, as one of the newest members of the team, he felt powerless to challenge Abernathy, so he did nothing.
Just two months before her death, Marilyn had purred happy birthday to the president at Madison Square Garden
Marilyn was 36 when she died – just a year older than Noguchi at the time – a fact that made him feel strangely connected to the woman on the table
In the meantime, the rumors started to swirl. Had the CIA assassinated Marilyn? Were the Kennedys involved? Had she been poisoned by the mafia?
In an attempt to silence the increasingly frenzied theories, Chief Coroner Theodore Curphey called a press conference and told a waiting world his verdict: Marilyn Monroe had died by her own hand.
She had ‘suffered psychiatric disturbance’ for some time, he said, including ‘severe fears and frequent depressions’ and sleep disturbances. She had also been ‘experienced in the use of sedative drugs and well aware of their dangers.’
He detailed her history of suicidal ideation and revealed that she had attempted to take her own life more than once, but on those occasions she had called for help and been saved.
His report concluded: ‘From the information collected about the events of the evening of August 4, it is our opinion that the same pattern was repeated except for the rescue.’
That should have been the end of it – the final word – but the public weren’t convinced.
Noguchi, ‘wanted to rectify the situation by having the stomach’s contents and organs tested,’ writes Choi, ‘but the toxicologist disposed of them once the coroner’s report was issued.
‘Without a complete analysis, it was impossible to rule out that Monroe had died by injection rather than by swallowing pills. But what could he do? He couldn’t challenge Curphey or the head toxicologist.’
As Noguchi tortured himself, he also started to wonder why such a high-profile autopsy had been assigned to him in the first place.
In the coming years, Noguchi – who rose in the ranks to become Chief Coroner – would oversee the autopsies of Robert F Kennedy, John Belushi, Natalie Wood and Sharon Tate. But in 1962, he was new to the job, still on probation and paying his dues.
Noguchi also performed the autopsy on Sharon Tate, who was murdered by the Manson Family in 1969
The death of Natalie Wood in 1981 has also been surrounded by mystery
Thomas Noguchi speaks to press after Sharon Tate’s murder
Noguchi is now 98 and hopes to reach the century mark says the book’s author
Marilyn, meanwhile, ‘was perhaps the most famous woman in the country, if not the world,’ writes Choi. ‘Why would the Chief Coroner have passed on such an opportunity?
‘He couldn’t shake the sense of uneasiness that had dogged him since the beginning. Was there a chance that she was murdered? Was he a pawn in a cover up?’
Even the prolific author James Patterson has questioned Noguchi’s role, writing in his upcoming book The Last Days Of Marilyn Monroe: ‘There is… something odd about the autopsy, when a junior medical examiner… is appointed rather than the more experienced chief examiner.’
Indeed, Noguchi was never able to truly shake these haunting doubts and, for decades, says Choi, he even feared he might be named as a suspect in her death.
As his career progressed, he became almost as famous – and controversial – as some of the celebrities whose autopsies he performed.
He was the inspiration for the Jack Klugman TV series Quincy ME, which ran for eight seasons.
Describing him as ‘messy, larger-than-life… equal parts brilliant and self-aggrandizing,’ Choi concludes, ‘Ultimately, his ego – his insatiable yearning to belong, to be seen and valued for his expertise, not just by his family, friends, and colleagues but by the entire world – was his downfall.’
Noguchi lost his job twice in the course of his career. First in 1969, amid accusations of mismanagement, but he won it back on appeal, claiming he was the target of racism.
Then again in 1982, following his outspoken handling of celebrity deaths including Natalie Wood’s. This time he was demoted to the role of physician specialist. He eventually retired in 1999.
However, Choi adds, he ‘continues to engage in research and publish in forensic science… and hopes to reach the century mark.’
L.A. Coroner: Thomas Noguchi and Death in Hollywood by Anne Soon Choi is published by Third State Books
