Betsy Arakawa seemed to make her normal routine in early February.
She made errands around Santa Fe as she wore a face mask. She visited a Sprout's food business, a CVS pharmacy and an animal business while she sent her massage therapist by e -mail.
The investigators now believe that she died two days later on February 11th. Her body was later found in the bathroom of the house, which she shared with her husband, the actor Gene Hackman. Prescription pills were scattered on a nearby worktop.
The 95 -year -old Hackman seems to have lived in the house for a few more days and have inflicted heart disease and Alzheimer's disease. It was found in a different room with a hiking pipe and sunglasses on his body. Officials believe he died on February 18.
Her bodies were discovered on February 26 by maintenance workers in their house in the Santa Fe Summit Housing Community.
The tragic revelations created on Friday by authorities in New Mexico solve many questions that were raised by the unusual deaths.
Hackman had lived in Santa Fe for years and gave up the Hollywood gloss for a quieter life in painting, community events, cycling and Pilates with his classic pianist woman, said friends. His health seemed to go back lately, and Arakawa took care of him, some friends said.
What do we know about Hackman's death?
Heather Jarrell, Chief Medical Examiner in the medical investigator's office, carried out the autopsy at Hackman and said that his brain shows “Advanced Alzheimer's disease and changes in blood vessels in the brain that are secondary after chronic blood pressure”.
“He was in a very bad state of health. He had a significant heart disease, and I think that ultimately led to his death, ”said Jarrell.
When asked whether Hackman's Alzheimer disease prevented him from determining whether his wife was dead, Jarrell could not say.
“I think this question is difficult to answer, but I can tell you that he was in an advanced state of Alzheimer's, and it is quite possible that he didn't know that she had died,” said Jarrell.
What about Arakawa?
According to Adan Mendoza, Sheriff of Santa Fe County, the investigators of Arakawa's last days have put together through surveillance material and e -mails.
She took off her dog from a veterinary hospital on February 9th. Then on February 11th she was seen in a local Sprouts supermarket around 3:30 p.m. and shortly before 4:30 p.m. in a supermarket of the sprout on surveillance material.
She stopped in an animal feed business and returned to her neighborhood shortly before 5 p.m. and activated the remote control to open the gate to her subdivision. Earlier a day, Arakawa wrote to her massage therapist by e -mail. According to officials, there was no e -mail activity the following day.
Although Jarrell did not find exactly where Arakawa had merged with Hantavirus, they noticed that it was transmitted by core droppings or saliva of rodents and characterized by symptoms, fever, muscle pain, cough, vomiting and diarrhea.
Erin Phipps, veterinarian of the state of New Mexico State Public Health, said there are signs of the entry of rodents in some structures on the property.
Officials said about 38% to 50% of the people in the southwest who are infected and the breathing speeches suffer from the disease.
What do we know how the couple was found?
They were found by two maintenance workers in their shared apartment shortly before 2 p.m. on February 26th.
The workers then notified a caretaker of the community who went into the house and then called in 911.
The caretaker did not have all the information when he called, but said he was looking through a window on two corpses that lay on the floor inside.
The caller can be heard on the 911 audio, which told the dispatcher that he could see what two motionless corpses were in the house. Silked, he repeatedly “damn” and asks the authorities to answer quickly.
“No, they don't move. Please send someone out of here quickly, ”says the caller.
According to an affidavit, Hackman's body was found on the floor near the kitchen and a mutroom. Arakawa's body was found in a bathroom at the main entrance of the house, and the prescription pills were scattered on a nearby worktop. Mendoza said that due to the law on the portability and accountability obligation of the health insurance and the obligation to account, he could not publish any details of the regulations.
The positioning of the couple's bodies showed that they suddenly fallen after the affidavit.
A dog was found dead in the house, while two other dogs were alive on the property and could enter and leave the residence through a door at the back. The dog's cause of death is unknown.
Officials later announced that, according to court files, they had removed medication for the treatment of high blood pressure, Tylenol and a medication to treat the thyroid gland.
What do we know about Hantavirus?
The disease is rare, but fatal – with a mortality rate between 38% and 50% infected among those in the American southwest, said Jarrell.
Hantaviruses are a family of viruses that are distributed according to the US centers for the control and prevention of diseases of rodent droppings, saliva and urine. Most of the Hantaviruses found in the USA can cause the Hantavirus syndrome.
People can inhale the syndrome by inhaling if they tidy up rodents. It can also be spread by touching contaminated objects and then touching your nose or mouth, bitten or scratched by an infected rodent or eaten with Hantavirus contaminated food.
Phipps found that Arakawa and Hackman's house had a “low risk” of exposure to Hantavirus, but said there were signs of rodents in other structures on the property. She said that New Mexico has confirmed one to seven Hantavirus cases annually in the past five years.
A total of 122 cases and 52 deaths were registered in New Mexico between 1993, when surveillance began, and in 2022, the last year, for which the CDC is publicly available. California reported 78 cases and 24 deaths in the same period.
The California cases contain a Hantavirus outbreak in the Yosemite National Park In summer 2012, visitors who live in tent huts infected. Eight Hantavirus syndrome experienced of the 10 infected people, five had to be intensive care with ventilation support and three died.
According to the CDC, the millet is the most common vector of the Hantavirus syndrome in the United States.