Deaths in May 2000

The following is a list of notable deaths in May 2000.

Entries for each day are listed alphabetically by surname. A typical entry lists information in the following sequence:
 * Name, age, country of citizenship at birth, subsequent country of citizenship (if applicable), reason for notability, cause of death (if known), and reference.

1

 * Cláudio Christovam de Pinho, 77, Nicknamed “Manager”.
 * John Emery, 84, British paediatric pathologist.
 * Gil Fates, 85, American television producer.
 * David J. Mahoney, 76, American businessman and philanthropist, heart disease.
 * Gibby Mbasela, 37, Zambian footballer.
 * Steve Reeves, 74, American actor, lymphoma.
 * Nora Swinburne, 97, British actress.
 * Jukka Tapanimäki, 38, Finnish game programmer, heart failure.
 * Gérard Théberge, 69, Canadian Olympic ice hockey player, bronze medalist (1956)

2

 * Laurie Calvin Battle, 87, American politician.
 * Belva Cottier, 79, American Sioux activist and social worker.
 * Bob Homme, 81, American-Canadian television actor, known for his role as The Friendly Giant, prostate cancer.
 * Bobbi Martin, 56, American country and pop music singer, songwriter, and guitarist, cancer.
 * Billy Munn, 88, British jazz pianist.
 * Harry Newman, 90, American football player.
 * Sundar Popo, 56, Trinidadian and Tobagonian musician.
 * Christina Marie Riggs, 28, American convicted murderer, execution by lethal injection.
 * Teri Thornton, 65, American jazz singer, bladder cancer.
 * Norman Wainwright, 85, English competition swimmer and Olympian.

3

 * Lewis Allen, 94, British film and television director.
 * Richard Friederich Arens, 81, American mathematician.
 * Obie Baizley, 82, Politician in Manitoba, Canada.
 * Ed Chapman, 94, American baseball player.
 * William Keys, 77, Australian Army officer.
 * Mamuka Kikaleishvili, 39, Georgian actor and film director.
 * Bryan Lobb, 69, English cricket player.
 * Yoshinao Nakada, 76, Japanese composer, colorectal cancer.
 * John Joseph O'Connor, 80, American Roman Catholic prelate, brain cancer.
 * Shakuntala Paranjpye, 94, Indian writer, actress and a social worker.
 * Jon Vincent, 38, American pornographic actor, suicide.
 * Edward J. Sponga, 82, American Jesuit priest in the Society of Jesus.

4

 * Sir Derick Ashe, 81, British diplomat.
 * Hendrik Casimir, 90, Dutch physicist known for the Casimir effect.
 * Humberto Donoso, 61, Chilean football player.
 * Jacques Gerschwiler, 101, Swiss figure skater and coach.
 * Alwyn Kurts, 84, Australian drama and comedy actor, liver failure.
 * Kieran Nugent, Provisional Irish Republican Army volunteer, cardiovascular disease.
 * Diana Ross, 89, English children's author.
 * Sugi Sito, 73, Mexican wrestler known as El Orgullo de Oriente.

5

 * Edward Ashley-Cooper, 93, Australian actor, congestive heart failure.
 * Gino Bartali, 85, Italian racing cyclist.
 * Jan Firbas, 79, Czech linguist.
 * Don Kindt, 74, American football player.
 * Rolf Magener, 89, German escapee from India during World War II.
 * Bill Musselman, 59, American basketball coach, stroke.

6

 * Benoy Choudhury, Indian freedom fighter and politician.
 * Eleazar Jiménez, 71, Cuban chess master.
 * Gordon McClymont, 79, Australian agricultural scientist and ecologist.
 * Lee Moore, 61, Saint Kitts and Nevis politician.
 * Roger von Norman, 91, Hungarian-born German film editor and director.
 * John Clive Ward, 75, British-Australian physicist, respiratory illness.
 * Sir Peter William Youens, 84, British diplomat and colonial administrator, pneumonia.

7

 * Dov Bar-Nir, 88, Belgium-Israeli politician.
 * Douglas Fairbanks Jr., 90, American actor and the son of Douglas Fairbanks, heart attack.
 * Hideo Hamamura, 71, Japanese marathon runner and Olympian.
 * Ferrel Harris, 59, American NASCAR racecar driver.
 * Henry Laskau, 83, American Olympic racewalker.
 * José Luis López de Lacalle, Spanish journalist and trade unionist, killed by the ETA.
 * Homer Thompson, 93, Canadian classical archaeologist.
 * Timmy Payungka Tjapangati, 58, Aboriginal Australian artist.
 * Masaru Shintani, 72, Japanese-Canadian master of karate, heart attack.

8

 * Pita Amor, 81, Mexican poet.
 * Stanley Boxer, 73, American abstract artist.
 * X Brands, 72, German-American actor.
 * Glen Bredon, 67, American mathematician.
 * William C. Brennan, 81, American lawyer and politician.
 * Dédé Fortin, 37, Canadian musician, suicide.
 * Hubert Maga, 83, Dahomey politician.
 * Henry Nicols, 26, American HIV/AIDS activist.

9

 * György Csordás, 71, Freestyle swimmer from Hungary.
 * Arthur Davis, 94, American animator and a director.
 * Chris Evans, 53, Canadian ice hockey player.
 * William Fairchild, 82, English author, playwright, director and screenwriter.
 * Todor Nikolov, 54, Bulgarian football player.
 * John Nucatola, 92, American basketball player, coach and referee.
 * Carmen Romano, 74, First Lady of Mexico (1976-1982).
 * Zheng Weishan, 84, Chinese general and politician.

10

 * Raymond Eddé, 87, Lebanese statesman.
 * Martin Farndale, 71, British army general.
 * Carden Gillenwater, 82, American baseball player.
 * Margaret Harris, 95, British costume designer.
 * Kiyoshi Kuromiya, 57, Japanese-American author and civil rights activist, cancer.
 * Virgil W. Raines, 89, American thoroughbred racehorse trainer.
 * Kaneto Shiozawa, 46, Japanese voice actor, cerebral contusion.
 * Dick Sprang, 84, American comic book artist and penciller.
 * Craig Stevens, 81, American actor, cancer.

11

 * Verna Aardema, 88, American writer.
 * David Bretherton, 76, American film editor, pneumonia.
 * Dale Jennings, 82, American LGBT rights activist, playwright and author.
 * René Muñoz, 62, Cuban actor and screenwriter, cancer.
 * Albert Roberts, 91, British politician.
 * Hanny Thalmann, 83, Swiss women's rights activist and politician.
 * Paula Wessely, 93, Austrian actress, bronchitis.

12

 * Pete Abele, 83, American politician (U.S. Representative for Ohio's 10th congressional district, Alzheimer's disease.
 * Dave Crowe, 66, New Zealand cricket player.
 * Dong Kingman, 89, Chinese American artist and watercolor master.
 * Adam Petty, 19, American race car driver, car crash.

13

 * Paul Bartel, 61, American actor, writer and director, liver cancer, heart attack.
 * Olivier Greif, 50, French composer.
 * Stanley Korchinski, 71, Canadian politician.
 * Boško Perošević, 43, Serbian politician.
 * Jumbo Tsuruta, 49, Japanese professional wrestler known as Jumbo Tsuruta, complications from liver transplant.
 * Cesare Valletti, 77, Italian operatic tenor.

14

 * Urda Arneberg, 71, Norwegian actress.
 * Johnny Cook, 51, American gospel singer formerly of the Happy Goodman Family.
 * Garrett Eckbo, 89, American landscape architect.
 * C. Eric Lincoln, 75, American scholar, diabetes.
 * Bob Maza, 60, Australian actor and playwright.
 * Keizō Obuchi, 62, Japanese politician and Prime Minister, stroke.
 * Rodman Rockefeller, 68, American businessman and philanthropist.
 * Karl Shapiro, 86, American poet.

15

 * Roberto Benedicto, 83, Filipino lawyer, diplomat and banker.
 * Geoff Goddard, 62, English songwriter, singer and instrumentalist, heart attack.
 * Robert Lee Knous, 82, American politician.
 * Alfred Kuchevsky, 68, Soviet ice hockey defenceman.
 * George Marshall, 96, American conservationist and political activist.
 * Gösta Prüzelius, 77, Swedish actor, leukemia.
 * Anthony Squire, 86, British screenwriter and director.

16

 * Bodacious, "World's Most Dangerous Bull" World Champion title holder.
 * Frido Frey, 78, German basketball player.
 * Evald Hermaküla, 58, Estonian actor and director, suicide.
 * Ghulam Ali Okarvi, 80, Pakistani Islamic scholar and jurist.
 * Andrzej Szczypiorski, 72, Polish novelist and politician.
 * Ronald Jay Williams, 72, Trinidadian businessman and politician.

17

 * Donald Coggan, 90, English Anglican and 101st Archbishop of Canterbury.
 * Hümeyra Hanımsultan, 82, Ottoman princess.
 * Elsie Lessa, 86, Brazilian journalist and writer of American descent.
 * William H. Poteat, 81, American philosopher, scholar and professor.
 * Sajjan, 79, Indian actor.
 * Angelina Stepanova, 94, Soviet and Russian stage and film actress, teacher.

18

 * Domingos da Guia, 87, Brazilian football player and manager, stroke.
 * Bruno Fait, 75, Italian racewalker and Olympian.
 * Denis Gifford, 72, British writer, broadcaster and journalist.
 * Doyle Lade, 79, American baseball player.
 * Yusuf Ludhianvi, 67/68, Pakistani Muslim scholar, author and muhaddith, murdered.

19

 * Lee Brewster, 57, American drag queen and transvestite activist, cancer.
 * John Grigas, 79, American gridiron football player.
 * Evgeniy Vasilievich Khrunov, 66, Soviet cosmonaut, heart attack.
 * Larry Lamb, 70, British newspaper editor.

20

 * Adelaide Aglietta, 59, Italian politician.
 * Charles Antenen, 70, Swiss football player.
 * Edward Bernds, 94, American director.
 * Dick Brown, 74, Canadian football player.
 * Loyd Jowers, 73, American restaurateur, heart attack.
 * David Pearce, 41, Welsh heavyweight boxing champion.
 * Jean-Pierre Rampal, 78, French flautist, heart failure.
 * Malik Sealy, 30, American basketball player, traffic collision.

21

 * Jules Alfonse, 88, American gridiron football player.
 * Barbara Cartland, 98, English novelist.
 * Buzzy Drootin, 80, American jazz drummer.
 * John Gielgud, 96, English actor.
 * Dulcie Holland, 87, Australian composer and music educator.
 * Mark R. Hughes, 44, American entrepreneur and founder of Herbalife, accidental overdose.
 * Erich Mielke, 92, German communist official.
 * Zhao Puchu, 92, Chinese religious leader and calligrapher.
 * Mahmoud Zuabi, Syrian politician and Prime Minister, suicide (disputed).

22

 * Bahadoor, Indian actor.
 * Krzysztof Boruń, 76, Polish physicist, journalist and science fiction writer.
 * David Brookman, 83, Australian politician, traffic collision.
 * Eldridge Dickey, 54, American gridiron football player, stroke.
 * Davie Fulton, 84, Canadian politician and judge.
 * Gary Kerkorian, 70, American football player.
 * Bennie Lee Sinclair, 61, American poet, novelist, and short story writer, heart attack.
 * David Chadwick Smith, 68, Canadian economist.
 * José Rafael Molina Ureña, 79, President of the Dominican Republic.

23

 * Eddy Blondeel, 94, Belgian commander of the SAS during WWII.
 * Roger Garrett, 59, American actor.
 * Jack Halliday, 71, American gridiron football player.
 * Mishari bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, Saudi prince as member of the House of Saud.

24

 * Kevin Lyons, 77, Australian politician.
 * Kurt Schork, 53, American reporter and war correspondent, homicide.
 * Majrooh Sultanpuri, 80, Indian Urdu poet and lyricist.
 * Cliff Sutter, 89, American tennis player.
 * Oleg Yefremov, 72, Soviet/Russian actor and theatre producer, lung disease.

25

 * Ken Bousfield, 80, British golfer.
 * Nicholas Clay, 53, British actor, liver cancer.
 * Elizabeth Durack, 84, Australian artist and writer.
 * Seymour S. Kety, 84, American neuroscientist.
 * Francis Lederer, 100, Austrian-American actor.
 * Jaya Pathirana, 79, Sri Lankan Supreme Court justice.

26

 * Sandra Gwyn, 65, Canadian journalist and writer.
 * William McCaughey, 70, American sound engineer.
 * Hamp Pool, 85, American football player, coach and scout, heart failure.
 * Max Schellenberg, 72, Swiss racing cyclist.
 * Samuel A. Taylor, 87, American playwright and screenwriter, heart failure.
 * Vernon Crompton Woodward, 83, Canadian fighter pilot and flying ace during World War II.
 * Sō Yamamura, 90, Japanese actor and film director, heart attack.

27

 * Inga Abel, 53, German actress, cancer.
 * Prince Gonzalo de Bourbon, 62, Spanish aristocrat, leukemia.
 * Kazimierz Leski, 87, Polish engineer, fighter pilot, and (counter-)intelligence officer.
 * Murray MacLehose, 82, British diplomat, Governor of Hong Kong.
 * Maurice Richard, 78, Canadian hockey player, cardiovascular disease.

28

 * George Irving Bell, 73, American scientist and mountaineer.
 * Donald Davies, 75, Welsh computer scientist.
 * Maraden Panggabean, 77, Indonesian Army general and Defense Minister, cerebrovascular disease.
 * Vincentas Sladkevičius, 79, Lithuanian Cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church.
 * Eric Turner, 31, American gridiron football player, stomach cancer.
 * Francisco Vestil, 86, Filipino basketball player and Olympian.
 * Heleen Sancisi Weerdenburg, 56, Dutch historian.

29

 * Clement Isong, 80, Nigerian banker and politician.
 * Robert T. Oliver, 90, American author and lecturer.
 * Aubrey Richards, 79, British actor.
 * Anthony Spinelli, 73, American actor and producer.
 * Doreen Young Wickremasinghe, 93, British communist politician.

30

 * Tex Beneke, 86, American bandleader and musician (Glenn Miller Orchestra).
 * Iko Carreira, 66, Angolan army general and politician.
 * Robert P. Casey, 68, American lawyer and politician, amyloidosis.
 * Doris Hare, 95, Welsh actress.
 * Daisuke Inoue, 58, Japanese singer and composer, suicide.
 * Ram Vilas Sharma, 87, Indian academic, poet and writer.
 * Bill Thomas, 78, American costume designer.

31

 * John Coolidge, 93, American businessman and son of President Calvin Coolidge.
 * Andrew Faulds, 77, British actor and Lpolitician.
 * Erich Kähler, 94, German mathematician.
 * Petar Mladenov, 63, Bulgarian communist diplomat and politician.
 * Nikolaos Oikonomides, 66, Greek byzantinist.
 * Rodolfo Pini, 73, Uruguayan football player.
 * Tito Puente, 77, American musician, songwriter ("Oye Como Va") and record producer, cardiac surgery.
 * Joe Puma, 72, American jazz guitarist.
 * Hank Ruszkowski, 74, American baseball player.
 * Walter Sparrow, 73, English film and television actor.
 * Johnnie Taylor, 66, American singer, heart attack.
 * A. Jeyaratnam Wilson, 72, Sri Lankan Tamil academic, historian and author.