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Numerous individuals have died while using a toilet facility or in the process of defecation or urination. This includes confirmed or suspected historical figures as well as more recent notable cases.
| data-sort-type="date" | Date | Location | Name | Age | Description | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| data-sort-value="1 January 102" | Summer of 581 BC | Jin, China | Duke Jing of Jin | Unknown | Died falling into a toilet pit. | [1] |
| 8 April 217 AD | Between Edessa and Carrhae, Roman Empire | Caracalla | 29 | Murdered by his soldiers while stopping to urinate, on his way to Edessa | [2] | |
| 11/12 March 222 | Rome | Elagabalus | 18 | Murdered by the Praetorian Guard "in a latrine in which he had taken refuge". | [3] | |
| data-sort-value="1 January 336" | 336 AD | Constantinople, Eastern Roman Empire | Arius | 80 | Died from explosive gastrointestinal problems while in a public toilet | [4] |
| 30 November 1016 | Oxford or London, England | King Edmund Ironside of England | 26 | Stabbed to death while defecating in a privy. | [5] | |
| 4 November 1035 | Lysá nad Labem, Bohemia | Jaromír, Duke of Bohemia | 60–70 | Was assassinated via being stabbed with a spear from under the privy seat while defecating. | [6] | |
| data-sort-value="26 February 1076" | 26 or 27 February 1076 | Vlaardingen, Lower Lorraine | Godfrey IV, Duke of Lower Lorraine | Unknown | Was assassinated via being stabbed with a spear from under the privy seat while defecating. | [7] |
| 19 April 1578 | Echigo Province, Japan | Uesugi Kenshin | 48 | Allegedly assassinated by a ninja while using a toilet, but very unlikely because his anticipation of his own death is recorded in a death poem. Early sources record his deterioration of health condition, his complaints of pain in the chest "like an iron ball", and as Kenshin Gunki (1582) records "on the 9th day of the 3rd month he had a stomach ache in his toilet. This unfortunately persisted until the 13th day when he died". It is much more likely that he suffered from esophageal cancer.[8] | [9] | |
| 25 October 1760 | Kensington Palace, London, England, Great Britain | George II of Great Britain | 76 | Collapsed shortly after attending to his close stool, possibly died of an aortic aneurysm. | [10] | |
| 1892 | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, U.S. | J.W., also known as Balloon Man | 29 | Suffered from congenital aganglionic megacolon, which brought him considerable fame for his bloated abdomen. He suffered from constipation, and was found dead in a bathroom at the age of 29, apparently having died trying to defecate. His eight foot long colon is currently on display at the Mütter Museum in Philadelphia. | [11] [12] | |
| Date | Location | Name | Age | Description | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3 August 1966 | Los Angeles, California, United States | Lenny Bruce | 40 | Died from acute morphine poisoning caused by an overdose in the bathroom of his home in Hollywood Hills. | [13] [14] |
| 22 June 1969 | Chelsea, London | Judy Garland | 47 | Overdosed on barbiturates while using a toilet. | [15] |
| 24 October 1971 | Paris, France | George Dyer | 38 | Overdose of alcohol and amphetamine while using a toilet. Portrayed in The Black Triptychs | |
| 16 August 1977 | Memphis, Tennessee | Elvis Presley | 42 | He was found dead on the bathroom floor. The cause of death was cardiac arrest due to alleged drug overdose. | [16] |
| 8 March 1989 | Columbia, South Carolina | Michael Godwin | 28 | Former Suffolk, Virginia resident accused of fatality beating 24-year-old Molly Royem with an iron in West Columbia, South Carolina sentenced to death by electrocution, but later reduced to a life sentence. He was accidentally electrocuted while attempting to fix a broken television set when he bit a pair of earphone wires while sitting on a metal toilet at the Central Correctional Institute in neighboring Columbia. | [17] |
| 19 January 1996 | Los Angeles, California, United States | Don Simpson | 52 | Died of heart failure caused by combined drug intoxication in the bathroom of his home in Bel Air. | [18] [19] |
| 8 March 2004 | Hollywood Hills, California, United States | Robert Pastorelli | 49 | Overdosed on morphine while on a toilet. | [20] |
| 25 June 2011 | Pilton, Somerset, United Kingdom | Christopher Shale | 56 | Died of a heart attack on a portable toilet while at Glastonbury Festival. | [21] |
| 17 May 2013 | Marcos Paz, Buenos Aires, Argentina | Jorge Rafael Videla | 87 | Died of a heart attack while on a jail toilet after slipping in the shower. | [22] |
| 10 October 2016 | Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Bavaria, Germany | Tamme Hanken | 56 | Died of sudden heart failure on a hotel toilet. | [23] |
| 21 June 2019 | Doha, Qatar | Toufiq M Seraj | 63 | Fell unconscious on an aeroplane toilet en route from Dhaka to Doha, pronounced dead of massive heart attack shortly after landing. | [24] |
| 23 November 2021 | Seoul, Republic of Korea | Chun Doo-hwan | 90 | Having multiple myeloma, found "fallen down" by a probable heart attack in a toilet at home. | [25] |
| 4 March 2022 | Auburndale, Florida, United States | Aaron Henderson | 43 | Crushed to death by a bulldozer while using a portable toilet. | [26] |
| 29 September 2024 | Moscow, Russian Federation | Damir Minkhuzov | 19 | Was found unresponsive on the bathroom floor of his dormitory in Moscow State University after major hangover. | |
produced several fictional advertisements for comedic value for a device called a "Toilet Death Ejector", in which a toilet would "eject" a person off of a toilet if they died on it so they would not be found dead on the toilet.[31]