The Marilyn Monroe Death Theory That Would Change Everything

Marilyn Monroe was a famous film star, whose beauty and talent became only more iconic due to her tragic and untimely death. At just 36, the blonde beauty was found dead in her Los Angeles home on the morning of August 5, 1962, via History. Monroe's cause of death was officially listed as a barbiturate overdose due to probable suicide, but not everyone bought the official explanation. And while Monroe's tragically young death has been a magnet for gossip and conspiracy theories since the very beginning, a new book asserts that everything we think we might know about Monroe's death is wrong.

While people have speculated that everyone from President John F. Kennedy to the mob was really behind Monroe's supposed suicide, Mike Rothmiller, a former detective with the Organized Crime Intelligence Division of the LAPD, has claimed that Monroe's death was really orchestrated by none other than the president's brother, Robert "Bobby" Kennedy (via the Latin Times).

Rothmiller's book, "Bombshell: The Night Bobby Kennedy Killed Marilyn Monroe," co-written with Douglas Thompson, asserted that Monroe's death was not really caused by a drug overdose. Instead, the former police officer claimed that Bobby Kennedy spiked Monroe's drink the night before her death, ultimately killing her. Monroe, who is believed to have had affairs with both married Kennedy brothers, was threatening to come forward and tell the world about her relationship with the famous politicians. Of course, the ambitious Kennedy family couldn't let that happen.

According to the Daily Mail, on the evening of August 4, the younger Kennedy appeared at Monroe's home in a fury. The couple soon became engaged in a fiery fight over her diary, which contained potentially damning entries about the Kennedy brothers. Kennedy demanded she hand the diary over, but Monroe refused. The argument went on for a long time, until Kennedy finally handed Monroe an unpleasant-tasting drink, telling her "Drink this, you'll feel better." After drinking the whole glass, Monroe laid down and never woke up again.

After her death, Rothmiller claimed the LAPD recovered Monroe's diary, and the entries seemed to confirm she was planning to talk. Researching through the LAPD's papers, Rothmiller discovered the potentially incriminating entries Monroe wrote in the days leading up to her death. 

"Frank [Sinatra], Peter and others were there. Frank said I can't keep my f****** mouth shut. He told me to get out. I don't know why he's treating me this way. What happened to me? I was drunk. I don't remember. Did I have sex?" she wrote in the week before her death (via Latin Times). 

In the next entry, which had an angrier tone, Monroe wrote "They are not calling back. Bob and John used me. I told Peter they're ignoring me. I'm not going to stand for that. I'm going to tell everyone about us." 

Her final entry, written the day before her death, read: "Peter said Robert will come tomorrow. I don't know if he will."

Until his death, Bobby Kennedy denied even being in Los Angeles the night Monroe died. However, according to Rothmiller's book, Peter Lawford, John F. Kennedy's brother-in-law, confessed to the former detective just before his own death in 1984, saying that he had been in Monroe's home that night and witnessed the whole thing, although he claimed that he believed Kennedy had merely slipped a sedative, not poison, into her drink.

Rothmiller is not the only person to put forth the theory that Bobby Kennedy was behind the actress's death. Godfather actor and former mob associate Gianni Russo has also claimed to know that Bobby Kennedy was behind the killing, orchestrating her murder in an effort to protect his and his brother's reputations. 

"It had to be Bobby. No one else would kill her. The mob would not have done it. They liked her ...," Russo explained to the New York Post in 2019. 

Rothmiller also claimed that his knowledge came at a price. According to MEAWW, just mere weeks after hearing Lawford's full story, Rothmiller was attacked by an anonymous motorcycle-riding gunman, who shot him in the back and side with a semi-automatic pistol. Rothmiller suffered life-threatening spinal damage, and, now fearing for his life, he never came forward publicly to talk about what he had learned — until his book was released in the summer of 2021.

But as bold as his claims may be, Rothmiller now stands by both Lawford's word and his allegations against Bobby Kennedy. "During my years of interviewing victims and interrogating suspects, I had only seen this type of response a few times, Rothmiller wrote of Lawford's confession via the Daily Mail. "It was clear he had been carrying the burden of guilt for many years and, in all likelihood, this guilt had destroyed his career and, sadly, him as a human being. But now he appeared comforted and serene, having released the horrible burden he'd been forced to carry. If I presented my evidence in any court of law, I'd get a conviction."