Deaths in March 2008

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The following is a list of notable deaths in March 2008.

March 2008

31

• Nikolai Baibakov, 97, Russian economist, Gosplan head (1955–1957, 1965–1985), pneumonia. [1] (Russian)
• Jules Dassin, 96, American film director (The Naked City, Rififi, Never on Sunday), influenza. [2]
• William Louis Dickinson, 82, American judge and Representative from Alabama (1965–1993), colon cancer. [3]
• Robert F. Goheen, 88, American President of Princeton University (1957–1972), Ambassador to India (1977–1980), heart failure. [4]
• Bill Keightley, 81, American equipment manager for Kentucky Wildcats men's basketball since 1962, bleeding from spinal tumor. [5]
• David Todd, 93, American architect, designed Manhattan Plaza, former chairman of NYC Landmarks Preservation Commission. [6]

30

• Marie-Françoise Audollent, 70, French actress, accidental fall. [7] (French)
• Anders Göthberg, 32, Swedish guitarist (Broder Daniel). [8] (Swedish)
• Douglas Kent Hall, 69, American writer and photographer. [9]
• David Leslie, 54, British racing driver and commentator, Farnborough plane crash. [10]
• Sean Levert, 39, American R&B singer. [11]
• Richard Lloyd, 63, British racing driver and team owner, Farnborough plane crash. [12]
• Jim Mooney, 88, American comic book artist. [13]
• David D. Newsom, 90, American Ambassador to the Philippines (1977–1978), respiratory failure. [14]
• Dith Pran, 65, Cambodian-born American journalist, survivor of the Killing Fields, pancreatic cancer. [15]

29

• Angus Fairhurst, 41, British artist, suicide by hanging. [16]
• Allan Ganley, 77, British jazz drummer. [17]
• Josef Mikl, 78, Austrian painter, cancer. [18]
• Isabella Nardoni, 5, Brazilian murder victim, thrown out of window. [19]
• Ralph Rapson, 93, American architect, heart attack. [20]
• Albert Stallard, Baron Stallard, 86, British Labour MP and life peer. [21]
• Myint Thein, 62, Burmese National League for Democracy spokesman, stomach cancer. [22]

28

• Lorne Ferguson, 77, Canadian ice hockey player. [23]
• Kunio Lemari, 65, Marshall Islands acting President (1996–1997). [24]
• Michael Podro, 77, British art historian. [25]
• Herb Rich, 79, American football player. [26]
• Ron Slinker, 62, American professional wrestler. [27]
• Helen Yglesias, 92, American novelist. [28]

27

• Jean-Marie Balestre, 86, French former President of FISA and later FIA. [29]
• Beverly Broadman, 60, American broadcaster with CNN and CBS News, cancer. [30]
• Billy Consolo, 73, American baseball player and coach, heart attack. [31]
• George Pruteanu, 60, Romanian literary critic and senator, heart attack. [32]

26

• Heath Benedict, 24, American football offensive lineman (Newberry College), 2008 NFL Draft prospect. [33]
• Christian Bergelin, 62, French politician. [34] (French)
• Robert Fagles, 74, American professor, poet and translator of ancient epics, prostate cancer. [35]
• Donald Hunter, 81, British football player. [36]
• Manuel Marulanda, 78, Colombian founder and commander-in-chief of terrorist organization FARC. [37]
• Wally Phillips, 82, American radio personality, pioneer of talk radio, Alzheimer's disease. [38]

25

• Art Aragon, 80, American boxer, stroke. [39]
• Ben Carnevale, 92, American college basketball coach. [40]
• Tony Church, 77, British actor. [41]
• Jimmy Dell, 83, British Wing Commander and test pilot. [42]
• Thierry Gilardi, 49, French journalist and TF1 sports commentator, heart attack. [43]
• Sergey Kramarenko, 61, Russian football player. [44]
• Abby Mann, 80, American screenwriter (Judgment at Nuremberg), heart failure. [45]
• Herb Peterson, 89, American fast food pioneer, inventor of the McDonald's Egg McMuffin. [46]
• Gene Puerling, 78, American vocal jazz musician, singer, musical arranger for the Hi-Los and Singers Unlimited. [47]
• Edward Rafeedie, 79, American senior judge for the California Central District Court, cancer. [48]
• Sérgio de Souza, 73, Brazilian journalist, co-founder and editor of Caros Amigos magazine, respiratory illness. [49] (Portuguese)
• Ivan Toms, 55, South African physician, activist against apartheid and conscription, meningitis. [50]

24

• Severin Cecile Abega, 52, Cameroonian author and anthropologist. [51]
• Chalmers Alford, 53, American jazz guitarist, diabetes. [52]
• Rafael Azcona, 81, Spanish screenwriter, lung cancer. [53]
• Victor Christ-Janer, 92, American architect. [54]
• John Cushley, 65, Scottish footballer (Celtic, West Ham United), motor neurone disease. [55]
• Ray Drinkwater, 76, British footballer (Queens Park Rangers). [56]
• Boris Dvornik, 68, Croatian actor, stroke. [57]
• Mary Joan Nielubowicz, 79, American head of the Navy Nurse Corps (1983–1987). [58]
• Hal Riney, 75, American advertising executive, founder of Publicis & Hal Riney, cancer. [59]
• Dina Sassoli, 87, Italian actress. [60] (Italian)
• Steven Sueppel, 42, American vice-president of Hills Bank and Trust Company, thief and murderer, suicide by car crash. [61]
• Sam Toy, 84, British chair of Ford UK (1980–1986). [62]
• Richard Widmark, 93, American actor (Kiss of Death, Judgment at Nuremberg), after long illness. [63]
• Sherri Wood, 28, Canadian journalist (Toronto Sun), brain cancer. [64]

23

• Big Jack Armstrong, 62, American radio DJ. [65]
• Neil Aspinall, 66, British road manager for The Beatles and executive of Apple Corps, lung cancer. [66]
• Al Copeland, 64, American restaurateur, founder of Popeyes Chicken, salivary gland cancer. [67]
• Hugo Correa, 81, Chilean journalist and science fiction writer. [68] (Spanish)
• Maryam Farman Farmaian, 94, Iranian feminist activist. [69]
• E. A. Markham, 68, Montserrat-born British poet and writer. [70]
• George Switzer, 92, American mineralogist, acquired the Hope Diamond for the Smithsonian Institution, pneumonia. [71]
• Chase Tatum, 34, American WCW wrestler and road manager for Outkast, apparent accidental drug overdose. [72]
• Vaino Vahing, 68, Estonian writer and psychiatrist. [73] (Estonian)

22

• Robert Dyk, 71, American television reporter (ABC News, WMTW-TV), cancer. [74]
• Arbella Ewing, 114, American who was the third-oldest verified person in the world. [75]
• Cachao López, 89, Cuban musician credited with creating mambo, renal failure. [76]
• Harvey Picker, 92, American philanthropist. [77]
• Adolfo Suárez Rivera, 81, Mexican cardinal, Archbishop Emeritus of Monterrey, brain hemorrhage. [78]

21

• Gadzhi Abashilov, 58, Russian journalist, chief of VGTRK TV company in Dagestan, shot. [79]
• Henri Blaffart, 42, Belgian wildlife conservationist for Conservation International in New Caledonia, drowned. [80]
• Tamás Bujkó, 45, Hungarian judo competitor, stabbed and beaten. [81]
• Denis Cosgrove, 59, British geographer and Alexander von Humboldt professor of geography at UCLA, cancer. [82]
• Roy Foster, 62, American baseball player. [83]
• John Fowler, 42, American drummer (Steelheart), brain aneurysm. [84]
• Lynne Golding-Kirk, 87, Australian ballerina, complications of surgery. [85]
• George Gross, 85, Canadian sports journalist, founding sports editor of the Toronto Sun, heart attack. [86]
• Shusha Guppy, 72, Iranian writer and singer. [87]
• Raymond Leblanc, 92, Belgian comic book producer and publisher (The Adventures of Tintin). [88]
• John List, 82, American mass murderer, complications of pneumonia. [89]
• Gabriel París Gordillo, 98, Colombian military governor, chairman of Colombian Military Junta. [90] (Spanish)
• Waltrude Schleyer, 92, German widow of Hanns-Martin Schleyer, advocate against the Red Army Faction. [91]
• Ilyas Shurpayev, 32, Russian journalist responsible for North Caucasus news on Channel One, murder by strangulation. [92]
• Merv Wallace, 91, New Zealand cricket captain (1952–1953). [93]

20

• Eric Ashton, 73, British rugby league player for Wigan and Great Britain, cancer. [94]
• Sobhan Babu, 71, Indian actor, cardiac arrest. [95]
• Ann Baumgartner, 89, American aviator. [96]
• Alexandru Custov, 53, Romanian footballer. [97] (Romanian)
• Klaus Dinger, 61, German drummer (Neu!, Kraftwerk), heart failure. [98]
• Prince Ferdinand, Duke of Castro, 81, Italian claimant to headship of the House of Bourbon-Two Sicilies. [99] (Italian)
• Jon Hassler, 74, American author, progressive supranuclear palsy. [100]
• Al Hofmann, 60, American drag racer, heart attack. [101]
• Carlos Galvão de Melo, 86, Portuguese general, Conservative member of National Salvation Junta. [102] (Portuguese)
• Bestia Salvaje, 46, Mexican lucha libre wrestler, liver disease. [103]
• Abigail Taylor, 6, American girl whose severe swimming pool injury led to tougher laws. [104].
• Brian Wilde, 80, British comedic actor (Porridge, Last of the Summer Wine). [105]

19

• Joe Blackledge, 79, British cricketer, former captain and president of the Lancashire County Cricket Club. [106]
• Sir Arthur C. Clarke, 90, Sri Lankan/British science fiction author (2001: A Space Odyssey), heart failure. [107]
• Hugo Claus, 78, Belgian author, voluntary euthanasia. [108]
• John Dowie, 93, Australian sculptor, stroke. [109]
• Mia Permanto, 19, Finnish singer, finalist in Idols. [110] (Finnish)
• Raghuvaran, 59, Indian actor, cardiac arrest. [111]
• Paul Scofield, 86, British Academy Award–winning actor (A Man for All Seasons), leukaemia. [112]
• Chantal Sébire, 53, French esthesioneuroblastoma sufferer and euthanasia activist, Pentobarbital overdose [113]

18

• Andrew Britton, 27, British-born spy novelist (The Assassin, The Invisible), undiagnosed heart condition. [114]
• Alan Buckley, 66, British rugby union and rugby league player. [115]
• Philip Jones Griffiths, 72, British photojournalist, cancer. [116]
• Jyrki Hämäläinen, 65, Finnish journalist, editor of Suosikki magazine. [117]
• Anthony Minghella, 54, British director (The English Patient, Cold Mountain), BFI chairman, post-surgery haemorrhage. [118]
• Geoffrey Pearson, 80, Canadian diplomat, son of former Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson. [119]
• Oreste Rizzini, 67, Italian voice actor, stomach cancer. [120] (Italian)
• Crispin Sanchez, 82, American pioneer of Mexican American education and sports. [121]

17

• Roland Arnall, 68, American owner of Ameriquest Mortgage, Ambassador to the Netherlands (2006–2008), cancer. [122]
• Claude Farell, 93, Austrian actress. [123] (German)
• Claus Luthe, 75, German automobile designer. [124]

16

• Anura Bandaranaike, 59, Sri Lankan politician. [125]
• Bill Brown, 95, Australian cricket captain, member of 1948 Invincibles team. [126]
• Ola Brunkert, 61, Swedish session drummer for ABBA, injuries from accidental fall. [127]
• Wayne Davis, 44, American football player, motor neurone disease. [128]
• Ivan Dixon, 76, American actor and director (Hogan's Heroes), hemorrhage. [129]
• Gary Hart, 66, American professional wrestling manager, heart attack. [130]
• John Hewer, 86, British actor (Captain Birdseye), natural causes. [131]
• Metropolitan Laurus, 80, Czechoslovakian-born American first hierarch of the ROCOR. [132]
• Daniel MacMaster, 39, Canadian rock vocalist (Bonham), group A streptococcal infection. [133]
• Mary Meader, 91, American aerial photographer. [134]
• Bob Purkey, 78, American baseball player, Alzheimer's disease. [135]
• John Shedd Reed, 90, American president of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway (1967–1986), natural causes. [136]
• Jonathan Williams, 79, American poet, photographer and publisher, founder of The Jargon Society. [137]

15

• Jacob DeShazer, 95, American bombardier, participant in the Doolittle Raid. [138]
• Mikey Dread, 54, Jamaican singer, record producer and broadcaster, brain tumor. [139]
• Vytautas Kernagis, 56, Lithuanian singer, television announcer, gastric cancer. [140]
• G. David Low, 52, American astronaut, colon cancer. [141]
• Benjamin Ngoubou, 83/84, Gabonese foreign minister. [142]
• Sam C. Pointer, Jr., 73, American federal judge for the District Court for the Northern District of Alabama (1970–2000). [143]
• Ken Reardon, 86, Canadian ice hockey defenceman (Montreal Canadiens), Alzheimer's disease. [144]
• Ross Scaife, 47, American classicist and digital humanist, cancer. [145]
• Vicki Van Meter, 26, American pilot, suicide by gunshot. [146]

14

• Mel Brandt, 88, American actor and announcer. [147]
• Clyde Cameron, 95, Australian politician, MP (1949–1980), Minister in the Whitlam Government. [148]
• Mike Dawson, 54, American football player, heart attack. [149]
• Chiara Lubich, 88, Italian Catholic activist, founder of the Focolare Movement. [150]
• Ingvald Ulveseth, 83, Norwegian politician. [151] (Norwegian)

13

• Taslim Arif, 53, Pakistani cricketer, lung infection. [152]
• Tessa Birnie, 73, New Zealand concert pianist. [153]
• Bill Bolick, 90, American country music performer (The Blue Sky Boys). [154]
• Iosif Boyarsky, 90, Russian former Soyuzmultfilm director, one of the fathers of Soviet animation. [155]
• Claire Brooks, 76, British politician. [156]
• Martin Fierro, 66, American saxophonist, cancer. [157]
• Scarlet Garcia, 23, Filipino model, shot. [158]
• Rafael Tufiño, 85, Puerto Rican painter and printmaker, lung cancer. [159]

12

• Folke Eriksson, 82, Swedish Olympic water polo player. [160] (Swedish)
• Erwin Geschonneck, 101, German actor. [161]
• Jorge Guinzburg, 59, Argentine journalist and comedian, pulmonary infection. [162]
• Alun Hoddinott, 78, Welsh composer. [163]
• Cassià Maria Just, 81, Spanish cleric, former abbot of Santa Maria de Montserrat, stroke. [164] (Spanish)
• Howard Metzenbaum, 90, American politician, Senator from Ohio (1974, 1976–1995). [165]
• Ovidiu Iuliu Moldovan, 66, Romanian actor, cancer. [166]
• Károly Németh, 85, Hungarian politician. [167]
• Lazare Ponticelli, 110, last official French veteran of World War I. [168]
• Asesela Ravuvu, 77, Fijian politician and former University of the South Pacific academic, natural causes. [169]
• Tom Tuohy, 90, British chemist, averted potential disaster at Windscale. [170]

11

• J. I. Albrecht, 77, American-born Canadian manager and director in the CFL, complications from a stroke. [171]
• Zakaria Deros, 62, Malaysian former politician, heart attack. [172]
• John Roderick, 93, American journalist (AP) and author, extensively covered China (1930s–2000s), heart failure and pneumonia. [173]
• Phyllis Spira, 64, South African prima ballerina, complications of surgery. [174]
• Michael J. Todd, 50, British Chief Constable of Greater Manchester Police. [175]
• Lukas Vischer, 81, Swiss theologian. [176]

10

• Richard Biegenwald, 67, American serial killer. [177]
• William Richard Bradford, 61, American serial killer, natural causes. [178]
• Hugh Brown, 88, British Labour politician, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (1974–1979). [179]
• Chuck Day, 65, American blues guitarist, wrote the distinctive riff in "Secret Agent Man". [180]
• Kurt Eberling, Sr., 77, German-American inventor of SpaghettiOs, cancer. [181]
• Dennis Irwin, 56, American jazz double bassist, complications of cancer. [182]
• Ana Kalandadze, 83, Georgian poet. [183]
• Vangelis Kazan, 70, Greek actor. [184] (Greek)
• Lee Ho-seong, 41, South Korean baseball player, thief and murderer, suicide by drowning. [185]
• Radovan Lukavský, 88, Czech actor. [186]
• Otto Schnellbacher, 84, American football and basketball player, cancer. [187]
• Dave Stevens, 52, American illustrator, creator of The Rocketeer, leukemia. [188]

9

• Gus Giordano, 84, American Emmy Award-winning jazz dancer, pneumonia. [189]
• Simon Reisman, 88, Canadian chief negotiator of the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement, cardiac arrest. [190]
• Varvara Semennikova, 117?, Russian who claimed to be oldest living person. [191]

8

• Al-Bandari bint Abdulaziz, 80, Saudi sister of King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. [192]
• Ossie Alvarez, 74, American Major League Baseball player (Washington Senators, Detroit Tigers). [193]
• Erwin Ballabio, 89, Swiss football goalkeeper. [194] (German)
• Carol Barnes, 63, British ITN news presenter, stroke. [195]
• Charles A. Gillespie, Jr., 72, American diplomat, Ambassador to Colombia and Chile, cancer. [196]
• Donald C. MacDonald, 94, Canadian politician, former leader of the Ontario New Democratic Party. [197]
• Les Smith, 80, British ex-Aston Villa footballer, cancer. [198]

7

• Luisa Isabel Álvarez de Toledo, 72, Spanish noblewoman and author. [199]
• Isaías Carrasco, 43, Spanish Basque politician, shot. [200]
• Leonardo Costagliola, 87, Italian football goalkeeper (ACF Fiorentina). [201]
• Dick Durrell, 82, American founding publisher of People magazine, lung cancer. [202]
• David Gale, 86, American mathematician, heart attack. [203]
• Leon Greenman, 97, British Holocaust survivor, only Englishman sent to Auschwitz. [204]
• Julius Paltiel, 83, Norwegian Holocaust survivor. [205]
• Francis Pym, 86, British Conservative Party politician, Foreign Secretary (1982–1983). [206]

6

• Gloria Shayne Baker, 84, American songwriter (Rain Rain Go Away, Do You Hear What I Hear?), lung cancer. [207]
• Lili Boniche, 87, Algerian-born French singer of Andalusian Arabic songs. [208]
• Don Curtis, 80, American professional wrestler, stroke. [209]
• Gustaw Holoubek, 84, Polish film and theatre actor and politician. [210]
• Stanislav Konopásek, 84, Czechoslovakian Olympic silver medallist in ice hockey (1948). [211]
• Peter Poreku Dery, 89, Ghanaian cardinal, Archbishop of Tamale (1974–1994). [212]
• K. Sivanesan, 51, Sri Lankan Tamil Parliament member (TNA), roadside bomb. [213]
• Malvin Wald, 90, American screenwriter (The Naked City). [214]

5

• Eve Carson, 22, American student leader (UNC Chapel Hill), shot. [215]
• Derek Dooley, 78, British footballer and former chairman of Sheffield United. [216]
• Elfriede Kaun, 93, German 1936 Olympic bronze medalist in the high jump. [217] (German)
• Nader Khalili, 72, Iranian architect, heart failure. [218]
• John C. Mackie, 87, American Representative from Michigan (1965–1967). [219]
• Richard Miles McCool, 86, American Medal of Honor recipient for actions during World War II. [220]
• Stephen Oliver, 66, American actor (Peyton Place), gastric cancer. [221]
• Joseph Weizenbaum, 85, German-born American computer scientist, inventor of ELIZA computer program, stroke. [222]
• Ihor Yemchuk, 77, Ukrainian Olympic silver (1952) and bronze (1956) medal-winning rower. [223]

4

• Robert Bruning, 79, Australian actor, heart attack. [224]
• Gary Gygax, 69, American co-creator of role-playing game Dungeons & Dragons. [225]
• Tina Lagostena Bassi, 82, Italian politician. [226]
• Elena Nathanael, 67, Greek actress, lung cancer. [227]
• Leonard Rosenman, 83, American Academy Award-winning composer, heart attack. [228]
• Semka Sokolović-Bertok, 72, Croatian actress, stroke. [229]
• George Walter, 79, Antiguan Premier (1971–1976), heart attack. [230]

3

• Ramón Barquín, 93, Cuban army colonel and diplomat, opponent of Fulgencio Batista, led 1956 coup attempt, cancer. [231]
• William Brice, 86, American painter and UCLA professor, injuries from fall. [232]
• Giuseppe Di Stefano, 86, Italian operatic tenor, after long coma following assault. [233]
• Donald S. Lopez, Sr., 84, American deputy director of the National Air and Space Museum, heart attack. [234]
• Malcolm McKenna, 77, American paleontologist. [235]
• Norm O'Neill, 71, Australian cricketer, throat cancer. [236]
• Annemarie Renger, 88, German politician (SPD), Speaker of Parliament (1972–1976). [237]
• Iván Ríos, 45, Colombian FARC commander, shot by his Chief of Security. [238]
• Norman "Hurricane" Smith, 85, British singer, recording engineer (The Beatles, Pink Floyd) and record producer. [239]
• Kenneth Woollcombe, 84, British Bishop of Oxford (1971–1978). [240]

2

• Sofiko Chiaureli, 70, Georgian actress. [241]
• Roger Gill, 35, Guyanese Olympic sprinter, car accident. [242]
• Jeff Healey, 41, Canadian jazz and blues-rock guitarist and vocalist, lung cancer. [243]
• Carl Hoddle, 40, British football player, brain aneurysm. [244]
• Paul Raymond, 82, British pornographic magazine publisher and property magnate. [245]
• Frederick Seitz, 96, American physicist who co-discovered the Wigner-Seitz cell. [246]

1

• Haroldo de Andrade, 73, Brazilian radio presenter (Rádio Globo), multiple organ dysfunction syndrome. [247] (Portuguese)
• Kevin John Dunn, 57, British Bishop of Hexham and Newcastle. [248]
• Bhanbhagta Gurung, 86, Nepalese Gurkha soldier, recipient of the Victoria Cross. [249]
• Raúl Reyes, 59, Colombian FARC second-in-command, airstrike. [250]
• Sid Spindler, 75, Polish-born Australian senator (Democrats) (1990–1996), liver cancer. [251]
• Andrey Tissin, 32, Russian world and European canoeing champion, Olympian and coach, drowning. [252] (Russian)
• George Toley, 91, American collegiate tennis coach. [253]