Top 10 Strange Deaths That Still Puzzle Investigators
#10: Thelma Todd
During the Golden Age of Hollywood, Todd was carving out her legend as a comedic actor when her life came to a tragic end. In 1935, she was found in her car inside the garage belonging to her business associates Jewel Carmen and Roland West in Los Angeles. At the time, Todd was reportedly having an affair with West. The night before the tragedy, she argued with her ex-husband at a party before being driven home by her chauffeur. It was officially deemed that she had perished from accidental carbon monoxide poisoning. However, some people claimed to have seen Todd alive the following morning. Reports of her being extorted and attacked days before added to the rumors that she was actually murdered.
#9: Gareth Williams
In 2010, after his colleagues reported not hearing from him for several days, police went to check on this MI6 employee at his residence in London. They discovered a large bag closed and locked on the outside. Inside was the key and Williams’ remains. The investigation found no fingerprints on the bag or lock and no forced entry. It’s not clear exactly how Williams died. An inquest concluded a poison or carbon dioxide poisoning was responsible and that a third party was likely involved. However, the Metropolitan Police controversially claimed Williams had locked himself in the bag – even though experts agreed that this was probably impossible. In 2015, a Russian defector claimed Williams had been assassinated by Russian intelligence for refusing to become a double agent.
#8: Rodney Marks
In 2000, what might be the first ever murder in Antarctica took place, and to this day, no one has been charged with it. At the time, Australian astrophysicist Rodney Marks was working at the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station. Over 3 days, Marks became unwell and sought aid from the station’s doctor. However, before his condition could be diagnosed, he passed away. Later, an autopsy determined the cause was methanol poisoning. The investigation deemed that Marks hadn’t done this to himself and must have unknowingly ingested the methanol. Yet a later coroner's report claimed there was no evidence of foul play. We may never know what actually happened to Rodney Marks.
#7: Karen Silkwood
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She was a chemical technician in Oklahoma in 1974 and was active in the union. During a normal testing procedure, she shockingly discovered her home and body contaminated with plutonium from her workplace. Silkwood testified to the Atomic Energy Commission about her terrifying find. Then, she made an appointment to meet with a journalist and a union leader to expose what had happened, allegedly taking evidence with her. However, Silkwood was found deceased in her car on the side of the road after hitting a culvert – and her evidence was missing. Officially, the investigation stated she had fallen asleep after taking sedatives and crashed her vehicle. However, evidence of another car at the site led to rumors that her death was actually murder.
#6: The Lead Masks Case
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In 1966, police arrived at a remote location in Rio de Janeiro to find the bodies of Manoel Pereira da Cruz and Miguel José Viana. What they discovered at the scene has led to confusion ever since. Both men were dressed in suits and wearing lead eye masks. Nearby was an empty water bottle, wet towels, and a notebook with strange instructions about swallowing a capsule at a specific time. Their cause of death couldn’t be determined, as the overstretched coroner's office was unable to examine the duo for weeks, leading to decomposition. With no explanation for their demise and no suspects, this resulted in all sorts of speculation about what happened, including aliens and cult involvement.
#5: Zigmund Adamski
After going missing for several days, the body of this coal miner was located by the police in Todmorden, England. Strangely, he was wearing a suit, but the shirt was missing along with his watch and wallet, and his hair had been roughly chopped. Adamski also had unusual burns on his shoulders, neck, and back that had been treated with a substance that forensics couldn’t identify. The coroner gave Adamski’s death an open verdict but recorded it to be a heart attack. Six months after this, one of the officers who investigated Adamski’s case, Adam Godfrey, spoke about seeing a UFO nearby. As such, this led to the theory that Adamski was taken by extraterrestrials.
#4: Edgar Allan Poe
As one of the pioneers of Gothic literature, Poe’s passing was just as bizarre and unsettling as his works. In 1849, after vanishing for a week, Poe was found at a tavern in Baltimore. He was wearing ill-fitting and unwashed second-hand clothes and had an unkempt appearance. Poe was seemingly delirious, perhaps intoxicated. He was taken to the hospital, but he died shortly after, giving no explanation of what had happened. Poe’s short story “The Mystery of Marie Rogêt” was based on another mysterious demise, that of Mary Rogers in 1841. After being missing for several days, her body was found in the Hudson River. No explanation for her passing was given, but it’s speculated gang violence or an abortion gone wrong was responsible.
#3: Elizabeth Short
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In January 1947, a gruesome discovery was made in a vacant lot in Los Angeles – the body of a young woman who had been cut in half. Nicknamed “Black Dahlia” by the press, Elizabeth Short was said to be an aspiring actor. Before her body was discovered, her whereabouts had been unknown for several days. Due to the lack of evidence at the scene, she had seemingly been killed elsewhere before being displayed in this shocking pose. There have been many theories over the years. One belief is that someone from the medical field was involved. Others have speculated Short was the victim of a serial killer. To this day, the case remains cold.
#2: The Somerton Man
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A man seemingly died in his sleep on Somerton Park beach in Adelaide, Australia in 1948. Yet the coroner couldn’t identify him nor the cause of his death. The investigators found a strange scrap of paper on him from a book of medieval Persian poetry, with the Persian phrase “tamám shud” written on it, which translates to “it is done.” Later, investigators turned up a suitcase seemingly belonging to the mystery man. Within were clothes, tools, and more questions. This enigma led to the theory that the Somerton Man was a spy. In 2022, researchers using DNA analysis determined the man to be Carl “Charles” Webb from Melbourne. While the police have yet to confirm this identification, there are already doubts about its accuracy.
#1: The Dyatlov Pass Incident
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In 1959, ten students from the Ural Polytechnical Institute in modern-day Russia set off for a skiing expedition in the Ural Mountains. After one student dropped out, the remaining, led by Igor Dyatlov, later missed a check-in with their sports club. Eventually, a search located their destroyed campsite, where the tent had been ripped from the inside out. After months, the search party found all the bodies of the hikers. Several of them were wearing little clothes and had sustained major injuries. Officially, the cause of death for one was a fractured skull, two had chest trauma, and six died from hypothermia. But for how this happened, no one knows for sure. Theories include an avalanche, military tests, or a tribal or wildlife attack.
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