Two days after the body of Kurt Cobain was found at his Madrona, Washington home, Courtney Love showed up at a vigil for her dead husband at a Seattle park and declared his death a tragic suicide. On a tape, she read excerpts from the note reportedly found beside his body to the 7,000 fans gathered to mourn the death of their hero. Media and police reports were already describing his "self-inflicted" gunshot wounds. Case closed. But, in a joint investigation with Ottawa's alternative radio station CKCU-FM, Canadian Disk has discovered many doubts about the suicide theory by those close to the case, a number harges that Cobain was actually murdered. The mystery begins on April 1, 1994 - a week before Cobain's body was found. On that day, he disappeared from a Los Angeles drug detoxication centre after telling the staff he was going outside for a cigarette.

When Courtney Love was informed of her husband's disappearance, she immediately cancelled his credit cards and hired the well-known Los Angeles private investigator Tom Grant to track down Cobain. Meanwhile, Cobain flew to Seattle and returned briefly to his Madrona home before disappearing again for the last time before his body was found in a room above the garage by an electrician on April 8. Beside the body was a shotgun and what was assumed to be a suicide note.Within hours, the world was told that the angst-ridden voice of a generation had taken a shotgun, placed it to his head and pulled the trigger. Copycat suicides by mournful fans were reported all over the world. Psychologists were trotted out by the media to explain the underlying motives for such an act.

Despite the open-and-shut case portrayed by the media, however, Seattle Police department investigators called to the scene were apparently not so convinced it was a suicide. The investigation was assigned to the Homicide Squad, who were reluctant to close then book on the case.For the next five weeks, an intensive investigation took place by homicide detectives who interviewed everybody remotely connected to Cobain, including friends, family and even his heroin dealer. Only in May did the Department officially close the case and declare the death a suicide.Homicide Squad Sergeant Don Cameron, the investigating detective, told Canadian Disk the department wanted to be extra cautious because of the high profile of the case."We looked at everything," he said, "and there was no doubt it was suicide".According to a source in the department, there was a fierce debate within the department about the possibility of murder. It's likely the lack of consensus was caused by a number of still unexplained events surrounding the death.

The most puzzling of these concerns Cobain's credit card transactions. After Love cancelled her husband's credit card on April 1, his bank reports a number of attempts to use the card during the following week. Several rejected charges ranging from $86.60 to $5,000 are reported on April 3 and 4, during the period when Cobain was missing but still alive. The Medical Examiner report states Cobain died on April 6. However, there are at least two attempted charges on the credit card after this date. Why? Cameron said police still don't know who was trying to use Cobain's credit card for days after he died.

A good part of the investigation is said to have focused on Courtney Love, although Cameron insists she wasn't a suspect. A heroin addict and former stripper known to be highly unstable, Love's relationship with Cobain was extremely stormy and had attracted the attention of police in the past.

On March 18, for example, Love called the police to report that her husband was armed and suicidal after he locked himself in a room with a gun at their home. But when police arrived, Cobain claimed he was hiding from Love nd had locked himself in to protect himself. A number of witnesses have also reported heated public quarrels between Cobain and Love in the weeks before his death.The most public break from the official version, however, comes from Tom Grant, the Beverly Hills private investigator Love hired to track the missing Cobain.Grant says after his investigation, he became convinced Cobain's death wasn't a suicide.He says he analysed the note found besides Cobain's body and concluded that it is not a suicide note at all but rather a message to fans that he was withdrawing from the music industry - not from life. Grant says when he enlared the note, he discovered a line at the bottom was written by someone else.

The last paragraph of Cobain's note reads, "I'm too much of an erratic, moody person that I don't have the passion any more. So remember, it's better to burn out than to fade away. Peace, love and empathy, Kurt Cobain."Grant, who worked for seven years as an LA County Sheriff's deputy before becoming a private detective 20 years ago, believes someone stuck a gun in Cobain's mouth and pulled the trigger while he was so full of heroin that he didn't know what was happening to him. The medical examiner's report found massive doses of opiates in Cobain's body. L.A. private investigator Tom Grant says police claim Cobain had propped a stool up against a door so it would have been impossible for anyone else to be in the same room when the gun went off. Grant's investigation, however, found that the stool was in front of two other unloccked doors that led to a balcony.

Immediately after Grant espoused his stheory, he was fired by Love. The investigator claims the Seattle Police haven't conducted a proper investigation and ther's been a lot of important facts overlooked. He strongly believes more than one person was involved in the murder.Sergeant Cameron, however, says the Police brought in their own hadwriting expert who concluded the not was genuine."If he brought us some evidence to back up his thoery, we would be glad to reopen the case," said Cameron. "But so far he's given us nothing.

"Kevin Campbell, spokesperson for Courtney Love's LA-based PR company, PMK, said "Grant's claims all fizzled out as quickly as they came. He said a lot of things to create a brouhaha but as far as we're concerned, the case is closed." Love's lawyer, Barry Tarlow, refused to comment on Grant's allegations.

In early March, Cobain overdosed on pills and champagne while in rome and lapsed into a near-fatal coma. Love claimed it was a suicide attempt, although Cobain insisted it was an accident. A number of people close to Cobain, however, still have nagging doubts about whether he would commit suicide and leave behing the baby daughter that he cherished.

Anna Woolverston is a Seattle music journalist who covered Cobain for years in several music publications including the Rocket and Alternative Press and now works at Sub Pop Records. "I certainly wouldn't rule out murder," says Woolverston. "He was cremated so ther's not much of the body to investigate but I find it very strange that he would take his own life because he loved his daughter so much. He lived for her."The buzz around Los Angeles and Seattle is that Tom Grant is waiting to reveal his best evidence for a lucrative book or magazine deal this summer". Stay tuned.

Reprinted without permission from Canadian Disk (June 1995)

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