Gene Hackman‘s neighbors admitted they barely ever saw the reclusive Hollywood legend in the decades before he was found mummified with his wife in their New Mexico home.
Hackman, 95, was found dead on his mud room floor Wednesday; his wife Betsy Arakawa, 65, lifeless in a bathroom by the front door, with prescription pills scattered around. One of their three dogs died near her.
Two days after the shocking discovery, police announced that they believe Hackman died on February 17, after finding that was the day his pacemaker stopped recording his heartbeat.
Police saw no signs of foul play but are also investigating the deaths as potentially suspicious.
The case is shrouded in the kind of intrigue reserved for Hackman’s detective thriller novels and has garnered international attention – with many wondering how their deaths went unnoticed for so long.
Neighbors in their gated private community off a winding canyon road five miles outside of Santa Fe told The New York Times that despite living with the celebrity couple for years, most of them never even caught a glimpse of them.
‘They have a gate, and we have a gate, and we just have never even seen each other,’ said James Everett, who has lived part-time in a house next door for about five years.
Bud Hamilton lived next door to the couple for about two decades, but said he and his wife had dinner with them only once in 20 years.
Gene Hackman, 95, and his wife Betsy Arakawa, 65, were found mummified in their New Mexico home
Many of their neighbors in the gated private community off a winding canyon road five miles outside of Santa Fe said they had never even met the couple
