The following is a list of notable deaths in April 2003.
Entries for each day are listed alphabetically by surname. A typical entry lists information in the following sequence: Name, age, country of citizenship at birth, subsequent country of citizenship (if applicable), reason for notability, cause of death (if known), and reference.
April 2003
1 Booker Bradshaw, 61, American record producer, actor, and Motown executive, heart attack. Lloyd L. Brown, 89, American writer, activist and labor organizer. Richard Caddel, 53, English poet, publisher and editor, a key figure in the British Poetry Revival, leukemia. Leslie Cheung, 46, Hong Kong actor and singer, suicide by jumping. Ted Chilcott, 79, Canadian Olympic rower (1952). Marcel Ernzer, 77, Luxembourgish cyclist and Olympian (1948). Jean-Yves Escoffier, 52, French cinematographer (Good Will Hunting, Rounders, Nurse Betty), heart attack. Sven Holmberg, 85, Swedish actor. Ed Kweller, 88, American basketball player. Robert M. Levine, 62, American historian and academic, cancer. Mendy Morein, 76, Canadian Olympic basketball player (1948). T. Ray Richeson, 79, American football player (Chicago Hornets), and coach. Mutsuhiro Watanabe, 85, Japanese war criminal during World War II. Adriaan Cornelis Zaanen, 89, Dutch mathematician, known for his books on Riesz spaces.
2 Hilly Flitcraft, 79, American baseball player (Philadelphia Phillies). Seymour Friedman, 85, American film director. Kaveh Golestan, 52, Iranian photojournalist and artist, land mine. Nick Klutka, 82, American football player (Florida Gators, Buffalo Bisons). Terenci Moix, 61, Spanish writer, pulmonary emphysema. Joan Phipson, 90, Australian children's writer. György Révész, 75, Hungarian screenwriter and film director. Harold S. Sawyer, 83, American politician (U.S. Representative for Michigan's 5th congressional district), throat cancer . Edwin Starr, 61, American soul singer, heart attack. Sékou Touré, 68, Ivorian football player. Michael Wayne, 68, American film producer and son of John Wayne, heart failure from complications of lupus.
3 Walter Ashbaugh, 74, American Olympic athlete (1952). Homer Banks, 61, American songwriter and record producer ("(If Loving You Is Wrong) I Don't Want to Be Right"), cancer. Arthur Guyton, 83, American physiologist, traffic collision. Scott Hain, 32, American convict, execution by lethal injection. Gunadasa Kapuge, 57, Sri Lankan musician, fall. Al MacBain, 77, Canadian lawyer and politician, member of the House of Commons of Canada (1980-1984).
4 Anthony Caruso, 86, American actor. Fred J. Cook, 92, American investigative journalist. Izzat Ghazzawi, 51, Palestinian writer. Abdul Kadir, 54, Indonesian footballer, kidney failure. Michael Kelly, 46, American journalist, columnist and magazine editor, war-related vehicular accident. Helmut Knochen, 93, German Nazi official and commander of the SiPo and SD. Billy McPhail, 75, Scottish football player, Alzheimer's disease. J. Quigg Newton, 91, American lawyer and politician. Resortes, 87, Mexican comedian, emphysema. Paul Ray Smith, 33, United States Army sergeant and Medal of Honor recipient, killed in action.
5 Kirby Doyle, 70, American poet. Adolf Harder, 76, German Olympic pentathlete (1952). Seymour Lubetzky, 104, American cataloging theorist and librarian. Frédéric Kibassa Maliba, 63, Congolese politician, heart attack. Federico Pizarro, 76, Argentine football player.
6 David Bloom, 39, American television journalist (NBC News, Weekend Today), pulmonary embolism. Anita Borg, 54, American computer scientist, advocate for the advancement of women in computer science, brain cancer. José Emeterio Rivas, Colombian radio journalist killed after publicly accusing local officials of corruption, gun shots. Gerald Emmett Carter, 91, Canadian Roman Catholic prelate, Archbishop of Toronto (1978-1990). Aleksandr Fatyushin, 52, Russian actor, pneumonia. Susan French, 91, American actress. Leon Levy, 77, American investor, fund manager, and philanthropist. Nicole Loraux, 59, French historian of classical Athens. Vic Metcalfe, 81, English football player. Babatunde Olatunji, 75, Nigerian drummer, recorded Drums of Passion, diabetes. Robert John Pratt, 96, Canadian comedian and politician. Boris Silchev, 77, Soviet Russian Olympic boxer (1952). Ivan Staykov, 76, Bulgarian Olympic cross-country skier (1952). Red Stephens, 72, American football player (San Francisco Dons, Washington Redskins). Princess Tenagnework, 91, Ethiopian royal and eldest child of Emperor Haile Selassie and Empress Menen Asfaw.
7 Knud Andersen, 85, Danish footballer. Cecile de Brunhoff, 99, French pianist and teacher, created the children's book character Babar the Elephant. Dick Doyle, 73, American football player (Pittsburgh Steelers, Denver Broncos). David Greene, 82, British television and film director, pancreatic cancer. Jutta Hipp, 78, Germen-American jazz pianist and composer, pancreatic cancer. Maurice Kouandété, 70, Beninese military officer and politician. Julio Anguita Parrado, 32, Spanish journalist and war correspondent (El Mundo), missile strike. Laymon Ramsey, 85, American baseball player. Robin Winks, 72, American professor, historian, author and diplomat.
8 Kathie Browne, 72, American film and television actress (Perry Mason, Gunsmoke, Star Trek, The Love Boat). Patrick Fani Chakaipa, 70, Zimbabwean prelate of the Roman Catholic Church, Archbishop of Harare (1976-2003). Charles Douglass, 93, Mexican-American sound engineer, credited as the inventor of the laugh track, pneumonia. Dee Gibson, 79, American basketball player (Tri-Cities Blackhawks). Maki Ishii, 66, Japanese composer of contemporary classical music, cancer. Spider Martin, 64, American photographer, suicide. Franz Rosenthal, 88, German-American professor of Semitic languages. Bing Russell, 76, American actor and baseball club owner, cancer. Jesse Warren, 88, American baseball player. Correspondents killed in the Battle of Baghdad: Tareq Ayyoub, 35, Jordanian journalist for Al Jazeera, missile strike. José Couso Permuy, 37, Spanish cameraman, missile strike. Taras Protsyuk, 35, Ukrainian cameraman, tank fire.
9 Earl Bramblett, 61, American mass murderer, execution by electrocution. Richard Doyle, 80, Canadian journalist, editor, and politician. Ray Murray, 85, American baseball player (Cleveland Indians, Philadelphia Athletics, Baltimore Orioles). Rod Navarro, 67, Filipino actor. Jorge Oteiza, 94, Basque Spanish sculptor, painter, and writer. Earl Richardson, 78, American baseball player. Robert Wallace Wilkins, 96, American medical researcher. Abraham Zabludovsky, 78, Mexican modernist architect (Rufino Tamayo Museum, National Auditorium). Vera Zorina, 86, Norwegian ballerina, actress and choreographer (The Goldwyn Follies, Star Spangled Rhythm), stroke. Wu Zuguang, 85, Chinese playwright, film director and social critic, stroke.
10 Abdul-Majid al-Khoei, 40, Iraqi Shia cleric, stabbed. Chumy Chúmez, 75, Spanish cartoon humorist, writer and film director, liver cancer. Rodolfo Díaz, 66, Argentine Olympic boxer (1956). Little Eva, 59, American pop singer (The Loco-Motion), cervical uterine cancer. Jack Fincher, 72, American screenwriter and journalist. Aatos Fred, 85, Finnish chess player, two-time Finnish Chess Championship winner (1947, 1955). Aubrey Jones, 91, British politician. Audley Richards, 43, British Olympic bobsledder (1988). Martti Sipilä, 87, Finnish cross-country skier and Olympian (1948). Franco Valle, 63, Italian boxer and Olympian (1964).
11 Vasyl Barka, 94, Ukrainian-American poet, writer, and literary critic. John Nevill Eliot, 90, English entomologist. Vid Fašaić, 91, Croatian Olympic rower (1936). Cecil Howard Green, 102, American businessman and founder of Texas Instruments. Siddiq Manzul, 71, Sudanese football player. Brian Nelson, 55, Northern Irish paramilitary intelligence chief, brain haemorrhage. Lucy Saroyan, 57, American actress and photographer, liver cirrhosis.
12 Clarence W. Blount, 81, American politician. Anikó Iglói, 94, Hungarian Olympic alpine skier (1948). Charles Janeway, 60, American immunologist. Sydney Lassick, 80, American film actor (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest), complications of diabetes. Štefan Matlák, 69, Slovak Olympic football player (1964). Chalom Messas, 94, Moroccan rabbi and writer. Hermann Schreiber, 93, Swiss pilot. Joan Sindelar, 71, American baseball player.
13 Farouk Afero, 63, Pakistani-Indonesian film actor, cancer. Majid bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, 64, Saudi prince and member of the House of Saud. Sean Delaney, 58, American musician, complications following strokes. Allen Eager, 76, American jazz tenor and alto saxophonist, liver cancer. Liam Horner, 59 Irish cyclist and Olympian (1968, 1972). D. Gale Johnson, 86, American economist and an expert on Russia and China. Lucy Shoe Meritt, 96, American classical archaeologist. Elder Tadej Štrbulović, 88, Serbian Orthodox elder and author.
14 Pierre Blondiaux, 81, French rower and Olympian (1952). Al Epperly, 84, American baseball player (Chicago Cubs, Brooklyn Dodgers). Addie McPhail, 97, American film actress. Jyrki Otila, 61, Finnish quiz show judge and member of the European Parliament. Milla Sannoner, 64, Italian film and television actress.
15 Betty Baskcomb, 88, British actress (Everything in the Garden, Afternoon of a Nymph, Doctor on the Go). Sherwood Brewer, 79, American baseball player. Don Bunce, 54, American football quarterback (Stanford, 1972 Rose Bowl MVP) and orthopedic surgeon, heart attack. Erin Fleming, 61, Canadian actress, suicide by gunshot. Robert Helmick, 66, American president of the US Olympic Committee, cardiac failure. Rebeca Iturbide, 78, Mexican-American actress, gastrointestinal perforation. Maurice Rapf, 88, American screenwriter and professor of film studies. Franco Scandurra, 91, Italian actor. Leonard Tose, 88, American sports executive, owner of the Philadelphia Eagles (1969-1985). Keith Walwyn, 47, Kittitian footballer, complications during heart surgery. Theodore Weiss, 86, American poet, professor and literary magazine editor.
16 Jack Donohue, 71, American-Canadian basketball coach. Isao Iwabuchi, 69, Japanese football player and Olympian (1956). Graham Jarvis, 72, Canadian actor (Misery, Fame, 7th Heaven), multiple myeloma. Samuel J. LeFrak, 85, American real estate tycoon.New York Times: "Paid Notice: Deaths LEFRAK, SAMUEL J." April 18, 2003. Ray Mendoza, 73, Mexican professional wrestler, kidney failure. Lili Muráti, 88, Hungarian film and stage actress. Danny O'Dea, 91, British actor. Jewell Young, 90, American basketball player (Purdue University, Indianapolis Kautskys, Oshkosh All-Stars).
17 Mario Sandoval Alarcón, 79, Guatemalan politician. Robert Atkins, 72, American nutritionist (Atkins Diet), accident. H. B. Bailey, 66, American NASCAR driver, heart attack. Godfrey Brunner, 81, Canadian Olympic sports shooter (1960). Russell Gentry Clark, 77, American district judge (United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri). Jean-Pierre Dogliani, 60, French football player. Frank Donovan, 84, Welsh footballer and Olympian (1948). John Paul Getty Jr., 70, British philanthropist and book collector, chest infection. Earl King, 69, American Blues musician/songwriter, complications of diabetes. Koji Kondo, 30, Japanese football player. Yiannis Latsis, 92, Greek shipping tycoon. Ong Poh Lim, 81, Malayan/Singaporean badminton player. Jozef Schell, 67, Belgian biologist. Hilde Sessak, 87, German actress. Ronnie Shanklin, 55, American football player (North Texas Mean Green, Pittsburgh Steelers, Chicago Bears). Graham Stuart Thomas, 94, British horticultural artist, author and garden designer. Peter Cathcart Wason, 78, British cognitive psychologist, founded the study of the psychology of reasoning. Sergei Yushenkov, 52, Russian politician, member of Russian Parliament and critic of President Vladimir Putin, homicide.
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