BEVERLY HILLS—With the anniversary of Natalie Wood’s death approaching, author Marti Rulli and yacht captain Dennis Davern are currently being interviewed by a major television news organization about the death of famed actress Natalie Wood, who was only 43-years-old when she died on November 29, 1981. Davern for years kept his silence about the tumultuous relationship Wood and her husband, movie star Robert Wagner shared, especially on that fateful night when she allegedly slipped into the water and after hours of being in the water, succumbed to her death by drowning.
San Francisco News spoke exclusively with the man who was the first on the scene when Wood’s body was found in the water. Roger Smith was the Supervising Rescue Boat Captain for Isthmus, Catalina Island, and as he held Natalie’s lifeless body in his hands, he knew at the time that history would forever know this acclaimed actress’s name forever. What he did not realize at the time, was the way the death would be mishandled by law enforcement authorities, who he believes wanted to end the investigation even before it began.
As the dossier and request to the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department reads from this witness. It begins, “I, Roger Smith, a citizen of the USA in California, hereby state as follows: I make this declaration for the purpose of inducing the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department to re-investigate the facts and circumstances surrounding the death of Natalie Wood on November 29, 1981 and to re-open the case for appropriate action as warranted.” With those words opening in his statement to the LASD, I had to ask the extremely polite and professional man to tell me his story. And to start with any recollections he had of Wood or Wagner before he found Natalie Wood’s lifeless body in the water. “
I did not see Robert Wagner much at all until he was interviewed onboard by the deputy sheriff Bill Kroll onboard the night of the accident. They liked to stay at Emerald Bay a lot, four miles west of Two Harbors. Whenever we patrolled with the Baywatch, we would see them on the deck of the boat and we would just wave as we went by. My wife used to work in the restaurant and when ever they came in they were nice to each other,” said Smith.
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
As the dossier and request to the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department reads from this witness. It begins, “I, Roger Smith, a citizen of the USA in California, hereby state as follows: I make this declaration for the purpose of inducing the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department to re-investigate the facts and circumstances surrounding the death of Natalie Wood on November 29, 1981 and to re-open the case for appropriate action as warranted.” With those words opening in his statement to the LASD, I had to ask the extremely polite and professional man to tell me his story. And to start with any recollections he had of Wood or Wagner before he found Natalie Wood’s lifeless body in the water. “
I did not see Robert Wagner much at all until he was interviewed onboard by the deputy sheriff Bill Kroll onboard the night of the accident. They liked to stay at Emerald Bay a lot, four miles west of Two Harbors. Whenever we patrolled with the Baywatch, we would see them on the deck of the boat and we would just wave as we went by. My wife used to work in the restaurant and when ever they came in they were nice to each other,” said Smith.
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
As the dossier and request to the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department reads from this witness. It begins, “I, Roger Smith, a citizen of the USA in California, hereby state as follows: I make this declaration for the purpose of inducing the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department to re-investigate the facts and circumstances surrounding the death of Natalie Wood on November 29, 1981 and to re-open the case for appropriate action as warranted.” With those words opening in his statement to the LASD, I had to ask the extremely polite and professional man to tell me his story. And to start with any recollections he had of Wood or Wagner before he found Natalie Wood’s lifeless body in the water. “
I did not see Robert Wagner much at all until he was interviewed onboard by the deputy sheriff Bill Kroll onboard the night of the accident. They liked to stay at Emerald Bay a lot, four miles west of Two Harbors. Whenever we patrolled with the Baywatch, we would see them on the deck of the boat and we would just wave as we went by. My wife used to work in the restaurant and when ever they came in they were nice to each other,” said Smith.
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
As the dossier and request to the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department reads from this witness. It begins, “I, Roger Smith, a citizen of the USA in California, hereby state as follows: I make this declaration for the purpose of inducing the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department to re-investigate the facts and circumstances surrounding the death of Natalie Wood on November 29, 1981 and to re-open the case for appropriate action as warranted.” With those words opening in his statement to the LASD, I had to ask the extremely polite and professional man to tell me his story. And to start with any recollections he had of Wood or Wagner before he found Natalie Wood’s lifeless body in the water. “
I did not see Robert Wagner much at all until he was interviewed onboard by the deputy sheriff Bill Kroll onboard the night of the accident. They liked to stay at Emerald Bay a lot, four miles west of Two Harbors. Whenever we patrolled with the Baywatch, we would see them on the deck of the boat and we would just wave as we went by. My wife used to work in the restaurant and when ever they came in they were nice to each other,” said Smith.
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down th
On the morning after the argument on the Splendour occurred, and Natalie Wood’s body was being swept by mild currents away from the Splendour, I asked the former rescue boat captain about Wagner’s demeanor while being questioned by the L.A. County Sheriff’s deputy who Smith arrived with that morning. “
I was next to the deputy when he questioned him [Robert Wagner], about his wife being missing since 1:30 a.m. And then the deputy pointed to our boat only 100 feet away from the Splendour and asked him why he did not call us or the Coast Guard? He said, ‘well they are a public agency and it would probably be put in the news. And she might be fooling around on some ones boat, and I did not want them to find her like that.’ Tommy, I personally thought that is too bad the famous can not be rescued because of who they are. So he and Doug Bombard had the Harbor boats and a shore boat go around to every boat and ask if they had seen her? He also said the skiff was missing and she might have gone ashore. He did mention the last time he saw her is when she came up from the raft cabin and said the skiff is banging on the boat and that she was going to retie it. So I went into the water to see if she could be under the boat, After searching I found nothing and got back onboard the Baywatch,” said Roger Smith.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Although Natalie Wood’s life had been in the public eye since she was a little girl, who starred in “Miracle on 34th Street” in 1947. However, Natalie’s career began in 1943. By the time of her death, she’d been Oscar nominated a record three times, for her roles in “Rebel Without a Cause,” “Splendor in the Grass” and “Love with the Proper Stranger.” It’s amazing how film titles often mirrored the star’s life, and her reputation in death. However, Wood lives on in the celluloid world today, and also in the hearts of her sister Lana Wood and author Marti Rulli, who are both lobbying to get the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department to take a fresh new look at evidence they believe proves that a proper investigation was never done in this case.
One of the most important aspects of Natalie’s death to the searching team, was after she was found, how they desired to offer her the dignity and privacy in death, they felt she deserved. Roger Smith tells
San Francisco News, “
As you know, Tommy, I did take her to the U.S.C Marine Science Center to avoid taking her through the public at Two Harbors. I was a treatment supervisor for scuba diving accidents. So I was very familiar with the facility. I laid Natalie at the entrance platform and the deputy and I took off her Down Jacket, and we had to check her out for any foul play. That is when we found out she had nothing on under her full length night gown. We looked carefully for anything unusual and did not find any bruising as suggested in Marti’s book.”
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would be Wagner for I.D. purposes. Instead the captain of the boat arrived! I pulled down the blanket from her face and he said yes that is her. I gave him her jewelry and he left. He did not see any other part of her and I always wondered why he said he did in the book? And I was also disappointed why Wagner did not come over, said Smith. “I did notice when I took off her rings that her fingers seemed pliable and thought she had not been deceased very long. And thought she must have let go of the raft where we found it off Blue Caverns Point. It was found one half mile away from where she ended up just below the surface. I wanted to find out how long she could have lived during her drifting hanging on to the lines on the boat, so I asked one of the guys at the school who studied physiology. He gave me a very complete report and came up with 3.3 to 4.9 hours depending on her willingness to survive hanging on to the boat with the head above water. The student used a lot of sources but could not reveal his name on the report due to repercussion of the event.”
Before Natalie Wood drowned, Smith found politics intolerable in his position. He had argued for the safety concerns of boaters as well as swimmers in the area before Wood’s death, but after the accident, he became aware of politics playing a much different role in his career. “When I argued with my deputy chief about the cut-backs may cause bad problems, he told me to just do it and he took one of my guards and moved him to Avalon and they were suppose to handle the calls after hours. And we were only to be a 9 to 5 operation only. So when the worst thing did happened I was to be the fall guy. This was all revealed in an article written by Kevin Cody who wrote for a local paper in Hermosa Beach, some time around March in 1982. The article was called ‘Anatomy of a Transfer.’ This gave information on how supervisor Dana was being embarrassed about his decision to make us only a 9 to 5 operation. Doug Bombard was at the meeting with my director. Dana told them he wanted me off the island now. Bombard agreed and my director tried to at least let my children finish their schooling for that year and Dana said, ‘no I want him off now.’ So I was reduced in rank and had to leave immediately working as a deck hand and being moved up and down the county from day to day,” said the former water rescuer.
Taking a deep breath, then continuing, “I closed her eyes which was very easy to do. When I looked at her she did not look like she had been deceased that long, as I had seen before in drowning victims. We covered her up with a disposable blanket. I took off her rings and jewelry while we waited for what I thought would
