Actress Alicia Witt's Parents' Cause of Death Revealed Two Months After Their Sudden Deaths
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A cause of death has been disclosed for the parents of actress Alicia Witt.
The cause of death for Robert Witt, 87, and Diane Witt, 75, was "probable cardiac dysrhythmia" due to the cold, according to death certificates issued on Wednesday and obtained by The Telegram & Gazette.
A rep for Witt did not immediately respond to PEOPLE's request for comment.
The news comes two months after Alicia, 46, announced her parents died in December. She hadn't heard from her parents in some time and requested a family member check on their Massachusetts home. Robert and Diane were found dead, according to their daughter.
"After not hearing back from my parents for several days, I reached out to a cousin who lives close to my parents to check on them," the actress said. "Sadly, the outcome was unimaginable. I ask for some privacy at this time to grieve and to wrap my head around this turn of events, and this surreal loss."
alicia witt/ instagram
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Authorities did not suspect trauma or foul play at the time of the discovery, reported the Telegram & Gazette which confirmed that Robert and Diane's home did not have a carbon monoxide leak, though the couple was apparently having problems with their furnace and had been using a space heater.
At the time, a neighbor told the local outlet that Robert and Diane were believed to be ill for some time and refused offers from neighbors to help with their home falling in "disrepair." Neighbors did help to mow the Witt lawn and clear snow, the neighbor stated.
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On Jan. 25, Alicia spoke out about her parents and opened up about their sudden deaths.
"It's been a month since I got scared, not having heard back from them, and called to have them checked on," she wrote on Facebook and Instagram alongside several photos of her parents. "Waiting, phone in hand, praying fervently that the next call would be from them, angry I'd gotten someone else involved. Knowing as soon as I heard the detective's voice on the other line that they were gone. Knowing I would never hear their voices again. Beginning the rest of my life of finding them on the breeze, in a song, in a dream."
She said she was able to "quietly travel" to Worcester in January to attend a "beautiful service and burial, to mourn and to celebrate them in total privacy."
Continuing her post, she thanked her loved ones and fans for their support. "Thank you, also, to all those who have reached out with your memories about my parents. They were brilliant educators, deeply kind, curious, intuitive, wise, young at heart, funny — there will never be enough adjectives to describe them," she said in part.
"I never imagined I would have to talk about this publicly — much less, amidst overwhelming floods of grief. I hadn't been allowed inside my parents' home for well over a decade; every time I offered to have something repaired for them, they refused to allow workers into their house. I begged, cried, tried to reason with them, tried to convince them to let me help them move - but every time, they became furious with me, telling me I had no right to tell them how to live their lives and that they had it all under control. It was not for a lack of trying on my part, or the part of other people who loved them," she recalled.
Further describing who her parents were, she said they "were not penniless" but "fiercely stubborn, beautifully original souls." The star also said her parents made choices that she "couldn't talk them out of." Nonetheless, she said she would help them in any way they would allow her to do so.
"I struggle, as much as I helped, with what else could I have done — short of petitioning the court system for taking control of two otherwise very sharp, very independent, very capable adults. They were a united, intertwined, indivisible force, determined to do things their own way," she said. "Knowing they had each other — battling them the way I would have had to in order to do this truly felt like it would have destroyed them. I had no idea that their heat had gone out. I will never understand how or why they made the choice not to tell me this, not to let me help them with this. My heart is broken."
Alicia is best known for her role in the 1984 film Dune as well as a recurring role as Zelda in Orange Is the New Black and small TV appearances in Twin Peaks, The Walking Dead and Friday Night Lights.
The actress and songwriter released her first book, Small Changes, in 2021 and released her fifth album The Conduit.
