April 8th 1994, music fans worldwide were horrified to learn of the tragic death of reluctant rock star Kurt Cobain. Cobain’s body was found in a room above the garage of his Seattle Washington home. He had apparently taken a large dose of heroin and killed himself with a shotgun. Even as the morning commenced, rumours began to circulate. What if Kurt Cobain did not kill himself? What if Kurt Cobain was murdered? One Private Investigator, who’s been in the case from the very beginning, believes the official ruling is wrong.

Tom Grant – Private Investigator
I don’t believe Kurt Cobain committed suicide. I believe there was someone with him in that room. I believe it was someone that he knew. They were doing heroin together. I believe at a certain point, more heroin was injected into Kurt Cobain than what he wanted injected into himself. And after that point he was shot with a shotgun once he had become totally incapacitated.

Sean O’ Donnell – Media Relations Officer for the Seattle Police Department
Our detectives actually went into this investigation on the premise that this was a homicide. That’s the way they conducted this investigation, so that there was a very thorough, comprehensive investigation done from the very beginning, and everything that the detectives encountered indicated to them that this was a suicide. We actually found nothing to indicate that this was anything but a suicide.

Kurt Cobain was the lead singer and creative force for Nirvana, the widely popular grunge rock band. But Cobain also made headlines for his drug addicted lifestyle. This photograph was taken on March 4th 1994, as Cobain was rushed to a hospital in Rome, Italy. He had overdosed on sedatives and alcohol and nearly died. Three weeks later on March 30th, family and friends persuaded Cobain to check into the Exodus Recovery Centre in Marina Del Ray, California. But, in less than 48 hours Cobain walked out and took a late night flight back to Seattle. A limo driver dropped Cobain off at his home, where his daughters male nanny saw him on the morning of April 2nd. The next day, Cobain’s wife, fellow rocker Courtney Love is said to have contacted Tom Grant, a Los Angeles Private Investigator and former LA County Sheriff’s Deputy. Grant claims he met with Love at a Beverley Hills hotel. He also says she did not mention that Cobain had been seen at their Seattle home the day before.

Tom Grant
We set up a surveillance in Seattle on a couple of locations and we were attempting to locate Kurt, and try to determine what he was doing, where he was, where he was going.. Courtney asked us of course not to contact him, not to make contact with him, just to report back where he was and what was going on.

When the surveillance failed, Grant himself flew to Seattle. He claims he and one of Cobain’s friends began searching. They checked Cobain’s usual hang outs. Then about 2am on April 7th, Grant says they went to Cobain’s house.

Tom Grant
We searched the entire interior of the house – the basement, the living room, the upstairs, the attic. We looked all through the house for Kurt. His friend when he went in the house made the comment that he had never seen the house this clean before, apparently it’s never been that straightened up. We didn’t locate Kurt, we didn’t see any indication that he had been at the house.

Some twenty hours later, Tom Grant says he and Cobain’s friend searched the house again. This time Grant claims they found a note left for Cobain by the male nanny.

Tom Grant
The first line of the note started off – “Kurt I can’t believe you managed to be in this house without me knowing.” We searched the entire interior of the residence once again for any evidence that Kurt might have been there the night before, or since we had left the location the first time. And we found no evidence that he had been there.

The next day, an electrician discovered Cobain’s body in a room above the garage, known as the Greenhouse. The only place Grant says he and Cobain’s friend did not check. According to Grant he was never told about the room, and it was too dark to see it.

Tom Grant
It just really seemed strange to me that the one place in that entire property that we didn’t search was a place that I was never told about. And of course the medical examiner later determined that Kurt had been laying up there dead for several days. So while we were searching the main house, Kurt Cobain was lying dead up above the garage.

This is a diagram of Tom Grant’s depiction of the death scene. A 20 gauge shotgun was still cradled across Kurt Cobain’s body. His heroin kit was at his side, and a note apparently written by Cobain was in plain sight. The first officers to arrive at the house reported that they were on the “scene of a suicide”.

Tom Grant
I contacted the police the day the body was found. I attempted on the telephone to get them to slow down a little bit. I indicated I felt something was wrong. They basically told me on the phone, ‘hey we know a suicide when we see a suicide’.

Tom Grant strongly disagrees and believes he has found a number of notable inconsistencies.

Item #1, according to Grant, Kurt Cobain carried only one credit card. Courtney Love had reportedly cancelled that card shortly after Cobain left the drug rehab in California.

Tom Grant
Now Courtney told me that she had stopped this credit card so that she could track Kurt’s activities, as he attempted to use the credit card. In actuality, stopping the credit card is what made it more difficult.

After the credit card was cancelled, the bank apparently recorded only the dates, the amounts and generic information. Amount worthy attempts were made to use the card.

Tom Grant
There was an attempt made on April 6th, in an amount of over $1500, there was another attempt made on April 8th, which was Friday the day the body was found, for an amount of $43. Now according to the medical examiner, Kurt had died sometime on April 5th, the previous Tuesday. Who was using the credit card?

Sean O’ Donnell
The information we’ve been able to receive from the bank has only been able to identify for us when the information was logged onto their mainframe computer, and not specifically when the attempt was made or who it was made by.

Tom Grant
Now after the body was discovered of course the police searched Kurt’s property. Two other cards were found in the wallet, but the actual credit card that Courtney had cancelled, the same card that someone was attempting to use after we now know Kurt was already dead, was not found in Kurt’s property.

Item #2, the autopsy reported showed Kurt Cobain’s blood contained a tranquiliser; Diazepam, and Heroin. According to Tom Grant and published news articles the level was 1.52mg/l. Some medical experts say that much heroin could kill a non-addict three times over.

Tom Grant
Could he with that much heroin and diazepam in his system, could he even pick up that shotgun? Wouldn’t he be incapacitated within seconds?

Cyril H. Wecht – Forensic Pathologist
For most people including addicts, 1.52mg/l of morphine is a significant level and for most of them, the great percentage, it would be a level that would induce a state of unconsciousness quite quickly; talking about seconds, not minutes.

Cyril Wecht is a nationally known forensic pathologist. Even though he hasn’t seen the autopsy report, but believes the suicide ruling correct. However he does find the high level of heroin intriguing.

Cyril H. Wecht I just cannot tell you that it would have been impossible for him to have shot himself because it was found that he had a level of 1.52mg/l of morphine at the post-mortem examination. It’s certainly within the realm of possibility, but it does raise a question as to whether or not he shot that shotgun.

Dr. Donald Reay – Chief Medical Examiner of King County, inspected Cobain’s body at the scene. He does not find Cobain’s heroin intake problematic.

Donald Reay
It’s really an issue of tolerance. How much is this person used too? If a person has gradually over months or years increased the dose, a person could function with that amount of drugs, narcotics, whatever it is present in the system. Again, so much of it depends upon individual tolerance over a period of time.

Item #3, police have checked the shotgun, the shotguns shells and the pen used to write the suicide note for finger prints. There were no legible prints on any of them.

Sean O’Donnell
I think its clear that anyone who is familiar with firearms and there use would know that as they hold a weapon that frequently that weapon will move in their hand. Additionally when that weapon is discharged that causes a jerking motion which causes the hands to move over the surface of the weapon. And all of those factors could cause any fingerprints that may have been left on the weapon to be unusable. Item #4, the alleged suicide note. Tom Grant believes it was actually a retirement letter to Cobain’s fans. There were rumours that Cobain was feeling burned out and was planning to adopt a lower profile. He had recently pulled out of the annual Lollapalooza tour. A decision which some speculate could have cost Cobain and others involved millions of dollars. This is a copy of the note that has been widely circulated. Tom Grant suggests that only the last four lines indicate suicide, they read – “Please keep going Courtney, for Frances, for her life, which will be so much happier without me…I love you, I love you”. Curiously these lines are written in much larger characters than the rest of the note. Unsolved Mysteries asked handwriting expert Marcel Matley to compare a copy of Cobain’s alleged suicide note with copies of two pages of lyrics, hand written by Cobain. Matley believes the bulk of the note was written by Cobain, but finds the last four lines questionable.

Marcel Matley – Handwriting Expert
As to the last four lines, there are more than a dozen differences that should give us pause, and we would have to reasonable explain these differences before we can conclude that the same person wrote the four lines that wrote the body of it.

Handwriting expert Reginald Alton of Oxford University also compared copies of Cobain’s handwriting to a copy of the note. In a five page written report, Alton pointed out more than a dozen discrepancies. Alton believes the bulk of the suicide note was written by Cobain, but raises questions about the first line and last four lines. His report concludes, quote “there are many indications that there may have been a second hand at work”. Alton cautions however that the copies are not good enough to make any firm pronouncement.

Sean O’ Donnell
We did take the note from the scene, and have it examined at the Washington State Crime Lab, and their analyst has indicated that it is her belief that this note was written by Mr. Cobain.

Tom Grant
Kurt Cobain had made an important decision in his life. He wanted out of the entertainment business, he didn’t want to tour anymore, he didn’t want to perform anymore. He wanted to be left alone; he never liked that aspect of being a performer. This decision that he had made was going to affect a lot of other people. He was no longer the money machine that he once was; now Cobain was worth more dead than he was alive.

But who would have wanted Kurt Cobain dead? Could it have been a mysterious user of his credit card? Could that same person add critical lines to Cobain’s alleged suicide note? For now those questions remain unanswered. Tom Grant believes the investigation should be reopened and the inconsistencies resolved once and for all.

Thanks to Matt @ kurtcobaincase.com for doing this transcript.

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