Entertainment
Chadwick Boseman Family Raised Questions About Opioid Levels in His System At Death In Tense Letter to Widow
Chadwick Boseman’s family had their lawyers fire off a letter to his widow weeks after the actor’s death … putting her on notice to preserve all of the data on his iPhone … TMZ has learned.
TMZ obtained the letter, dated November 16, 2020, from lawyers for Chadwick’s parents and brothers — Leroy, Carolyn, Derrick and Kevin Boseman — to lawyers for his widow Taylor Simone Ledward Boseman.
The family’s lawyer requested that Simone’s legal team agree to “execute a release for Chad’s medical records” and asked that they digitally image his cell phones, computers, iPads, and other electronics to preserve any relevant information.
They also asked for copies of all accounting for Chadwick’s bank accounts, adding that their “only hope is this case is to fulfill Chad’s actual intent and ensure that the distribution of assets aligns with the free will that God gave him.”
Simone’s lawyer fired back in a letter dated December 1, 2020, saying “With regard to the content and tenor of your letter, the sudden misguided and aggressive nature of your correspondence is both a disappointment to my client and requires now an entirely different posture.”
In her letter, Simone’s team said their client had tried to work with the brothers to share info and include them “gratuitously in Ms. Boseman’s projects to honor her late husband’s legacy.”
The letter went on to say the “family has now forced a situation which will now have to proceed by the book. I intend to protect my client from the bogus and avaricious claims insinuated by your correspondence.”
Simone’s lawyer claimed the brothers were sullying the image of “a magnificent role model many who has been tragically taken from the world far too soon, that will be on them, and I assure you it will be met with all means at our disposal.”
Things did not get better with time. In another letter, dated August 23, 2021, the brothers’ counsel continued slamming Simone.
The family said they asked Simone for the medical records due to questions about why he was found on the floor of his bedroom on the day he died. The family claimed it wanted an autopsy but Simone initially did not because his body had been through enough.
The letter said that an autopsy was completed on September 1, 2020, and revealed some “startling results that raised some serious concern about the medical advice/or therapy he was receiving.”
The letter claimed the toxicology revealed that 0.12 mg/l of hydromorphone in Chadwick’s system at the time of death and said this number was “extremely troubling” because it was 4x the highest therapeutic concentration and “well into the toxic range.”
The brothers also wanted all recordings Chadwick made about how to distribute his fortune. The letter stated they believed Chad made a recording stating 90% of his residuals from his films should be split evenly among his parents and two brothers.
Simone’s lawyer fired back on September 2, 2021, writing, “Perhaps the single most revealing detail, as case in point, is the fact that we heard nothing from you for nine months and now, within days of the one-year anniversary of Mr. Boseman’s passing, you chose to send this disturbing letter without any concern, sensitivity or even consciousness of what this time, or your letter, would mean to someone who truly loved him and suffers his loss every day and especially at this time of remembrance.”
As TMZ first reported, Kevin and Derrick filed docs to remove Simone as administrator of Chadwick’s estate … which she is adamantly opposing.