Actor Gene Hackman's pacemaker recorded 'last event' on 17 February, tests show

TESTS ON A pacemaker belonging to the late actor Gene Hackman have found that the last event was recorded on 17 February, police have said.

The two-time Oscar winner, 95, and his wife Betsy Arakawa, 65, were found dead, along with one of their dogs, at their home in New Mexico on Wednesday, and police said there were no apparent signs of foul play.

During a press conference yesterday evening, Santa Fe County Sheriff Adan Mendoza told reporters that officers were called to the scene following a request to carry out a welfare check at Hackman’s home by a maintenance worker.

Hackman and his wife were discovered in separate rooms, he said, and the remains of one dog were also discovered. Two other, surviving dogs were also found at the property.

Initial post-mortem examinations, carried out by the pathologist at Santa Fe, have determined that no external trauma was caused to either individual and there is no evidence of carbon monoxide poisoning at this time.

The causes of death for both Hackman and Arakawa have yet to be determined, Mendoza said, and the results of a toxicology report are pending. Initial tests have found that the last event recorded on Hackman’s pacemaker was on 17 February 2025.

Further examinations will continue, media were told outside the County Sheriff’s office yesterday. Police maintained that there is no evidence of foul play in this case.

Search warrants carried out at the property led to the seizure of two mobile phones, medical records from 2025, a diary and various medicines, Mendoza said. The investigations into the deaths continue.

The moment when a pacemaker stops working could mark the point when a person dies but not always, according to Dr Philip Keen, the retired chief medical examiner in Maricopa County, Arizona.

He said later: “If your heart required a pacemaker, there would certainly be an interruption at that point – and it might be the hallmark of when the death occurred.

“But it’s not necessarily because some people get a pacemaker to augment things, not necessarily replace things.”

He also felt it would be unlikely for a person who tests negative for carbon monoxide initially to later be found to have been poisoned by it.

Hackman, who was widely respected as one of the greatest actors of his generation, was a five-time Oscar nominee who won best actor in a leading role for The French Connection in 1972 and best actor in a supporting role for Unforgiven two decades later.

His daughters Elizabeth and Leslie, and his granddaughter Annie, said they will miss the actor “sorely” and are “devastated by the loss”.

Includes reporting by Press Association