Police have released pictures from inside the hotel room where Soundgarden rocker Chris Cornell died.
The musician committed suicide by hanging in a room in the MGM Grand Detroit hotel in Detroit, Michigan on May 18, with Detroit police then launching an investigation into his passing.
After nearly two months of looking into the tragedy, information obtained by a Freedom of Information Act request has revealed further details of Cornell’s death, including photographs of the scene, the 911 call made by a hotel employee, investigators’ reports and a statement from Cornell’s bodyguard Martin Kirsten.
The pictures appear to sum up initial findings of seven different drugs being found in Cornell’s system, including a heavy dose of anti-anxiety medication Lorazepam, aka Ativan. Bottles of prescription drugs prednisone, an anti-inflammatory, and omeprazole, an antacid, were also pictured inside the blood-spattered room, alongside a piece of exercise apparatus Cornell presumably used to hang himself.
It was Cornell’s wife Vicky who first raised the alarm, calling Kirsten and asking him to check on her spouse because “he did not sound like he was OK.”
Upon visiting the suite, room 1136, Kirsten was unable to get into the locked room, so kicked open the main door, before doing the same with the door into the suite’s bedroom.
“I went inside and the bathroom door was partially opened, and I could see his feet,” Kirsten told police in a signed statement.
He then loosened the band around Cornell’s neck and attempted to resuscitate him. While medical personnel were summoned after a hotel employee called the emergency services, Cornell was pronounced dead at around 1.30am – over an hour after Kirsten was first contacted by Vicky.
Audio of the 911 call was also released, with the employee reporting a “non-responsive guest… inside of room 1136”.
“The guest was attempting to hang himself,” the caller said, before stressing that Cornell was not breathing.
