Dana Plato's death

[Brettxwt]

Years later, it is clear to myself and many others that Dana's death was not a suicide. As more information surfaces, many things are telling me this was not an accident, either. At this point, all we can do is at least try and piece some of this together from what we know about Dana and the last days of her life, and what information has come forward in the 15 years since her passing.

Say what you want about Shane Bugbee, but the man is not a liar. From day one, his stories have never changed and he has told the truth from the very beginning, as the phone calls between him and Dana confirm. He may have cared about money, and that may be all that he still cares about in this case, but I believe he will be the one that helps crack this case one day. Dana Plato's Last Breath only makes her last days THAT much clearer...

The lack of an investigation into that POS Robert Menchaca, to this very day is staggering. Lord knows if this had happened ANYWHERE other than Oklahoma that the police wouldn't have been so eager to take his word for it, when it was quite apparent that his stories were always changing and never consistent. The guy had every reason in the world to benefit from her death. What kind of hand he had in Dana Plato's death is debated, but the guy is RESPONSIBLE in some way or another. I'm sure the fact that Dana was planning on leaving him 2 days later and moving to Chicago doesn't help his case any. People who knew Robert had all said he was very abusive, jealous, and just a flat out control freak, as well as a known meth user. The dude was also broke and currently had no job, so if she had left him, he'd lose EVERYTHING, including the Winnebago which was DANA'S. It's safe to say his free ride would be over. Let's not forget that the 4 or 500 dollars that was wired to Dana a day or two before her death was never found and that on the night before/afternoon of her death the pair had argued. Notice how Robert never mentioned that to the police, either. Things are just not adding up here. Also, why was he signing contracts for Dana? Contracts that were paying her $5,000 for her appearances, might I add, another thing Robert conveniently failed to mention to the police.

In yet ANOTHER detail he evaded from the police, Robert made it clear in his calls to Shane that while in New York, Dana had apparently been mugged. Strange? What do you think?? This was something she had NEVER mentioned to Shane and a police report was NEVER written..why is this? Was this Robert's excuse to explain away any possible bruises or needle marks found? Was this Robert's excuse to explain why the money was missing? You'd think that'd be an important detail to tell the police...

The problem is, her body was cremated so quickly after the autopsy and any evidence they had was never tested. I'd like to know what became of the syringe that was discovered. Why didn't anyone ever check for needle marks? Why wasn't the freaking syringe tested??? The autopsy overlooked a few things and could have been more thorough. However, no one thought to look into Robert Menchaca at the time as a possible suspect so there was never any point. It was an open and shut case. It was so easy to just accept that she had taken too many pills and took her life, and that was the end of it. Dana would not want to be remembered this way, and if Tyler were still here, he would not want his dear mother to be remembered this way either.

It frustrates me that the police never spoke to Shane Bugbee through any of this, as he was the closest person to Dana at the time of her death aside from Tyler. It wasn't until he put out the book that anyone even entertained the idea of Robert as a possible suspect or person of interest. It wasn't until years after that information had been revealed about Dana and Robert's relationship being less than perfect, to say the least, that would have prompted police to take a good long hard look at Robert, as well as checking into his past. This wouldn't have been the first time Robert Menchaca was part of an abusive relationship, hint hint. Depending on who you ask, Robert was also in a bisexual relationship with an Oklahoma police officer at the time leading up to Dana's death that nobody even knew about. Explain that one, Robert Something tells me the two had definitely argued about more than just money that weekend...

From what I can gather, Dana was off hard drugs at this point, at least the last year of her life, and that anything she was taking was all prescribed legally, mostly valium and lortab. The combined amount of pills found in her system is quite troubling. Don't forget, this is someone who overdosed on the lethal valium at age 14 as well as an arrest and jail time for forging prescriptions for the drug in 1992. Looking back at interviews around '98/beginning of '99, as well as reports from people who were there, Dana was overly worried and cautious of her addiction to the drug and had Robert administering her pills towards the end. For someone who was so cautious and worried about her addiction to the drug, again this just doesn't add up. There's just no way she could have/would have intentionally put that many pills down her throat into her system like that, especially in such a small timeframe, and not know what she was doing. Even if it was intentional or was an accident, Valium, in that quantity, especially if taken with lortab, would have made her thrown up considerably. She would have thrown up before she passed out. Her body would have rejected the drugs and gotten rid of them before they did any real damage. Even if she had passed out fairly quickly, there at least would have been evidence of vomit in the Winnebago Plato was in when she died. And yet, nothing. Unless, she was ALREADY unconscious when the drugs had entered her system, which would explain why vomit was found ONLY in her airways. Hmmmmm...

Perhaps the BIGGEST inconsistency in this whole case is in Robert's account of the events from that afternoon. Dana was arriving back from New York and had made arrangements with Robert to be picked up at the airport at 1 in the afternoon sharp. Robert was late picking Dana up and had made a call at 1:30 to Bugbee, claiming that he wasn't able to find her in the spot she was supposed to be waiting for him at. It wasn't until about a little after 3 that Robert called him back and told him that he finally had located Dana and that they were heading to his parents' house. Dana was already out like a light at this point. The problem with that is that the medical examiner places the approximate time of death at around 2, confirming that she had to have died between 1 and 3pm. He was CLEARLY trying to build an alibi for himself, and if we go by what he said, it narrows it down even further and puts her death between 1:30 and 3pm

Remember that a syringe was found at the scene and to this day has remained untested? Ask yourself why that would have any relevance to this case, and again that answer comes back to...guess who, Robert Menchaca, whose mother was a registered nurse. It certainly would explain how such a high quantity of pills could end up in her system like that in such a short amount of time. Once again, this JUST DOESN'T ADD UP! I know that this is all purely circumstantial, but people have gone to jail for less evidence than this...I mean, Dana had apparently been sleeping for most of that day, it's very likely she had been drugged, he had more than enough chances to do it even with that small window of time he had. Dana was nothing but a mealticket to him, so if he didn't directly kill her, he sat and watched her die as she was officially dead a full 8 HOURS before the 911 call was made. Rather than attending to her and getting her help, the bastard took pictures. That was when she began to "look blue", per his words, her lungs had started to fill up with fluid (according to the policeman's statement) and he did nothing. She was no more than an hour away from death at this point, which doesn't coincide with the report that Robert had initially told police he didn't discover her dead until HOURS later. Why does the medical examiner place her death at around 2, yet he doesn't call Shane until after 3? I'm sure by this point, anyone can see that none of this adds up at all. Not one bit of it. Not to mention, even AFTER her death, he continued to make attempts to profit from her death. At the VERY LEAST, the guy should be charged with criminal negligence, involuntary manslaughter, etc. something, although I don't think it is really that simple. He made sure she was dead and whether or not that was the intention all along, it didn't hurt.

The point of all of this is we all know something happened between Dana and Robert that fateful afternoon. We have the two arguing, a call from Dana to Shane after, a call from Robert to Shane in the trailer, and then the last call from Robert to Shane and the 911 call. Now, what happened in between is what will make or break this case. Unfortunately, all we can do is hope and wait. Either for someone else to come forward with new information or more evidence to be found, and that one day a strong enough case can be built against Robert. All I want is justice for Dana. If not for her, then for Tyler He never lived long enough to see justice for his mom...

The fact is, in the last week of her life things were looking way up for Dana. For the first time in years, she was finally serious and motivated to get her life together again, reviving her acting career, and just be the mother that Tyler never had. More than anything, she wanted to make money and "quit being Dana Plato and start being Tyler's mom". Her appearance on the Howard Stern show to promote Expo of the Extreme II in Chicago was supposed to be the first stop of a long awaited comeback. She had gone on the show to deny allegations of current drug use and rumors of her being a lesbian, and had already been making plans with Shane to make yet ANOTHER appearance on Stern in the future. The Chicago Tribune was calling to do a story on her past (not her tabloid past, her ACTING past) and her acting future, and another call from a local theater wanting her to join the cast of a play, an actual paying acting gig. She was through the roof, her life was drastically changing for the better. She was thrilled she had done the Stern interview, felt like a huge weight had been lifted from her shoulders after so long, and it had been the happiest she had felt in YEARS (straight from the horse's mouth). Unfortunately, it all paints an even bleaker picture as to what quite happened after... what went wrong?