Danny Gans death house sold

The mansion in which Danny Gans died has been sold, cutting another tie between the family of the late Las Vegas superstar and the city with which he'd been identified for more than a decade.

Coldwell Bankers announced that the lavish estate owned by Gans and his wife Julie was sold quietly this week to a couple from California. Reports say they paid about $9 million for the 9,400-square-foot French-chateau styled main residence on 2.57 acres in Roma Hills in neighboring Henderson, Nevada.

Gans designed the estate, which includes a guest house house, built atop of basement garage in which Gans kept his collection of 20 cars.


Coldwell coordinated the estate sale in conjunction with the auction of a dozen of Gans’ cars and bikes by the Barrett-Jackson auctioneers (the lot fetched about half a million dollars).

Gans' wife and three kids pulled up stakes and moved to the Los Angeles area shortly after Julie Gans called 911 to report she'd found the superstar musical impressionist was found dead in his bedroom in the early hours of May 1, 2009. The charitable, athletic Born Again Christian and family man overdosed on hydromorphone, a powerful opiate sold as Dilaudid and known on the streets as "drug store heroin."

Las Vegas Weekly celebrates Danny Gans' special friend Alicia Jacobs-- but doesn't get into that 4 a.m. phone call or all those texts he'd sent her

The Las Vegas Weekly and its editor Scott Dickensheets have rolled out another cover story on a major figure in the Danny Gans case. Following up on last week's confessions from Las Vegas blogger, New York Times stringer, Gay Vegas author, concert promoter and comp queen Steve Friess, comes a laudatory profile of controversial beauty queen-turned-television entertainment reporter Alicia Jacobs.

Jacobs was a close personal friend of Gans, and on May 1, 2009, the the first member of the media to learn of Gans' death, getting a 4 a.m. phone call from Gans' manager Chip Lightman. The article touches upon the incident without exploring the details of the morning or her relationship with the musical impressionist:

"Jacobs defends her reporting of Gans’ death last year. The two were genuinely close. They dined together and, sharing an interest in physical fitness, worked out together. Jacobs was the first journalist contacted by Gans’ manager, Chip Lightman, after he learned of Gans’ death.

"Danny Gans and Alicia Jacobs became close friends during her career in Vegas. Jacobs sobbed through her segment announcing Gans had died and spoke emotionally of their friendship. It was a unique moment in broadcast news for the emotion displayed on-air by the reporter. Local media critics pounced.

“'I have thought about that and re-lived it many, many times in my head. Honest to God, I would not have done anything differently,' says Jacobs. 'I thought I could get through the story. But I remember seeing b-roll of Danny on one of the monitors, singing and dancing, and losing it. To this day I don’t believe he is gone … So, yes, I got a little emotional on the air. You know what? It was real. We are real. Sometimes it’s okay to be real on the air. People cry, hurt and feel pain. I wouldn’t change it.'”

"But what about--?" No, there is no follow-up.

The profile, From Beauty Queen to Extra: The Journey of LV's Top Celebrity Broadcaster, is written by Las Vegas Sun columnist John Katsilometes, a journalist who touched on Gans' rumoured drug use in his initial story about Gans' sudden passing at 52 (the powerful opiate Dilaudid would be named as a cause), but who backed off immediately along with the rest of the Las Vegas media pack. Perhaps that's why it celebrates Jacobs' role as a correspondent on the syndicated television infotainment show, Extra, and is full of sympathetic, humanizing notes about her adoption, disfiguring car crash and career-threatening love of animals, while not pressing her on the issue for which she's gained the most notoriety.


An accompanying photo of Jacobs as "Mrs. United States," however, does reveal that she is not a natural blonde.

Those texts? Click here to read all about them.

And click here to read Kat's fascinating article. Even with his hands tied, he's a great entertainment writer.

Meanwhile, we look forward to next week's cover story on Chip Lightman.

Gans family thanks us for remembering

The family of Las Vegas superstar Danny Gans has thanked Tabloid Baby.com for remembering the first anniversary of his sad, untimely and mysterious passing on May 1st.


We take no satisfaction in the knowledge that we were the only news organization to mark the approach and date of this tragic milestone. There was no surprise that the Las Vegas media and its flamboyant leading figures deliberately avoided mention of the anniversary. They were exposed over the past twelve month with their embarrassing, shameful and deliberate refusal to investigate the circumstances that led to the musical impressionist's death.


Gans 'widow and children, however, made special mention this week on the revamped and very much alive official Danny Gans website, thanking us and fans around the world for our acknowledgment:

The family is truly touched by your kind emails, blogs and notes that have been received from around the world remembering Danny and supporting us at this time. Our day was spent with family and a few friends sharing memories of Danny, yet mindful of the magnitude of our loss and to that of his fans everywhere.We thank you for your continued support and prayers.

Please keep in touch.

-Julie, Amy, Andrew & Emily Gans

Danny Gans (Oct. 25, 1956 - May 1, 2009)

One year ago today, Danny Gans took a nap from which he did not awaken

Las Vegas superstar Danny Gans died in the early hours of May 1st, 2009.

A corrupt and lazy local news media have yet to fully examine the circumstances of his death or life.

Click here to read our comprehensive coverage.

Son says Danny Gans was planning retirement when he "took some medicine and took a nap and never woke up"

In the latest twist on the official story of how Las Vegas Strip headliner Danny Gans died from an overdose of hydromorphone, his son says that "he just took some medicine and took a nap and he never woke up."

Andrew Gans also revealed that his father was planning his retirement when he died mysteriously in his bedroom in the early hours of May 1st.

But it's the latest admission that Danny Gans was on a regimen of prescription painkillers that raises new questions about earlier denials by Gans' friends and colleagues and the shameful, willful avoidance of news coverage by the Las Vegas media.

In the weeks before the coroner ruled he'd died from taking the powerful opiate known as "the drugstore heroin" and commercially as Dilaudid, friends and acquaintances expressed shock that the supposedly clean-loving Christian has taken any drug whatsover.

In the months to follow, as more revelations about Gans' battle with pain from variois injuries and possible use of steroids due to vocal problems, as well as his ownership of a drug supply, the story told out by friends and family has taken on shadings and twists.

Twenty-year-old Andrew and his sister Amy, the two oldest of Gans three children, interview on KNPR radio spoke on Nevada public radio station KNPR to promote the recently published autobiography, the Voices In My Head (click here to read the first and only major national review).

Planning to retire

The first news to break in the interview was when Andrew told interviewer Ian Mylchreest (right) that his father was preparing for retirement, even though he was only weeks into a longterm engagement at Steve Wynn's Encore Hotel & Casino.

"Planning, maybe possibly. He didn't really talked about it too much. My dad had lots of energy, and tons of vocal left when he passed, but he knew it was going to be coming within the next decade or so, so he was just always thinking about what's next, always planning and always seeing how much further he could go in his carer.There was no, there was never any set date of when he wanted to retire, it was just up to him. And God."

Speaking via telephone from the family's new home in Los Angeles, Andrew said he and his family were not aware that Danny Gans had heart problems (coroner Mike Murphy stated that Gans had hypertensive cardiovascular disease, a condition that causes increased blood pressure and makes the heart work overtime, as well as polycythemia, a condition that caused his red blood cell count to go up- the opposite of anemia).

"No. We knew that he had high blood pressure and some issues with his shoulders and his back where he had a lot of pain cause he had to have surgery. Um, he had a little heart issue but it was never something that he complained about or talked about to much. He wanted to keep-- because it was always something he could handle and he could take care of."

Andrew spoke of the pain his father endured while on stage due to several shoulder surgeries, and claimed he often refained from taking prescribed medicine because the drugs affected his voice.

Mylchreest then asked if he was surprised that prescription drugs played a part in his fathers death.

"That my Dad too painkillers for the pain?"

"Right."

"No. I think that was pretty normal, I had three shoulder surgeries and whenever I was in pain, I took painkillers, just the prescribed amount that the doctor gave me, that's what my Dad did. He'd actually gotten back from playing golf and he had a sore back he just took some medicine and took a nap and he never woke up."

This was at least the third time Gans' children have been trotted out to promote the autobiography or to address the controversial aspects of his death. Gans' wife Julie, who was with him when he died, has not been seen or heard from since the tragedy. She moved the family from the Henderson, Nevada estate to the Los Angeles area shortly afterwards.

Gans' manager Chip Lightman caused a controversy that the Las Vegas news media chose to overlook when he consciously contradicted Julie Gans' statements and the official timeline of Gans death. Henderson Police detectives reiterated there was no evidence of foul play, nor reason to doubt Mrs. Gans' timeline.

Click here to here the entire interview with Andrew and Amy Gans

The interview features selections from Danny Gans' overlooked album. Click here for more information on Brand New Dream..

911 calls: Brittany Murphy vs. Danny Gans

SHARON MURPHY 911 CALL ..... JULIE GANS 911 CALL

How would one react upon awakening to find a loved one unexpectedly unresponsive, and from all indications, dead? The continuing drumbeat of celebrity deaths and the intense investigation and speculation accorded them by the media have made these awful events open to public scrutiny and interpretation. The 911 calls, made by the mother of tragic actress Brittany Murphy and the wife of Las Vegas superstar Danny Gans, however, reveal that reactions and actions of those tossed into the grief-stricken maelstrom vary considerably, and are certainly not so easy to judge.

BRITTANY MURPHY DEATH HOUSE, HOLLYWOOD HILLS

DANNY GANS DEATH HOUSE, HENDERSON, NEVADA