back to article Debian founder Ian Murdock killed himself – SF medical examiner

Debian Linux founder Ian Murdock, who died late last year in strange circumstances, killed himself, according to an autopsy report obtained this week. On the evening of December 28, the 42-year-old fired off a string of increasingly incoherent tweets, claiming he had been beaten up by police officers near his home on Green …

  1. Ralph B

    With friends like that ...

    So, friends of a guy claiming he had been beaten up by the police called the police department to send a cop around to his house to check on him.

    How was that supposed to end well?

    1. TonyJ

      Re: With friends like that ...

      From what has been written it sounds like he had a long history of drinking and mental health issues combined with a somewhat fiery temper. How would you have handled it?

      It sounds like HE fought with the police. Let's not tar every single one of them as violent power crazy mugs, eh?

      On the face of it, it sounds like a tragic set of circumstances that lead to someone ending their own life which is always, always sad and my sympathies go out to his family.

      1. h4rm0ny

        Re: With friends like that ...

        >>"From what has been written it sounds like he had a long history of drinking and mental health issues combined with a somewhat fiery temper"

        Honestly, based on the experiences of friends, I'd be inclined to extend him some benefit of the doubt. After the police have beaten someone up (and that happens often enough) then any media attention is usually followed by rapid and aggressive character assassination toward the victim. We've seen that many times with numerous citable cases.

      2. Whiznot

        Re: With friends like that ...

        Here in the good old USA only fools call the cops to help a friend. If your enemy needs assistance, consider calling out the swat team for help. View the award-winning film "Peace Officer" made by the sheriff who founded Utah's first Swat team that years later gunned down one of his family members. http://www.peaceofficerfilm.com/

        A real friend would get in touch with mutual friends to find a better option. I'm sure that there had to be someone in San Francisco who cared for Murdock.

    2. John Robson Silver badge

      Re: With friends like that ...

      Who would you send round if you didn't live within range?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: With friends like that ...

        Not the cops, for sure.

        I worked for them. The stories I could tell you.

        1. John Robson Silver badge

          Re: With friends like that ...

          "Not the cops, for sure."

          Not the question asked - who *do* you call to a friend who you think is suicidal, and who lives hundreds of miles away?

          1. Aaiieeee

            Re: With friends like that ...

            100 miles isn't too far to drive for a suicidal friend - I'm sure family and work commitments will be understanding (if they are not then I question their priorities); its impractical to do it regularly so after the first visit it would be necessary to figure out some kind of support framework for them.

            Disclaimer: I have never had to do this so am speaking my mind.

            I have come to notice almost everything I do is regulated by the underlying knowledge that I have to be at work tomorrow morning. In this case work clearly comes second.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: With friends like that ...

              "100 miles isn't too far to drive for a suicidal friend"

              But you'd be in denial, wouldn't you, if you thought they wouldn't do anything in the couple of hours the drive would take?

        2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

          Re: With friends like that ...

          "Not the cops, for sure.

          I worked for them. The stories I could tell you."

          Maybe you didn't work for them long enough to discover just how self-destructive a drunk can be. There's the purely passive - fall asleep and choke on their own vomit - I've investigated a few of those. There's the active - I investigated one case where he found a piece of broken glass in the cell, a broken spectacle lens from a previous occupant (yup, the cell should have been checked more thoroughly) and cut himself. And finally there's the complete apeshit. I remember being called by the local police because they wanted an independent witness to that one - he'd already damaged the door of one cell and they're tough structures.

          The fact is that the severely drunk are a danger to themselves and practically impossible to look after as they ought to be under medical supervision but hospitals can't take them and the cells, which are all the police have, aren't safe environments for them.

          In the Linux world we all owed a great deal to Ian Murdock. It's very sad that he reached such an end and my sympathy goes out to everyone concerned, family, friends and, yes, police.

          1. Triggerfish

            Re: With friends like that ...

            The original story said the cops were called and by the time they got there he had already killed himself. So I am guessing if you cannot get someone there faster than the police, someone who also can deal with someone who seems a bit disturbed. Then you have no chance.

            My sympathies to the family.

          2. SImon Hobson Bronze badge

            Re: With friends like that ...

            > The fact is that the severely drunk are a danger to themselves and practically impossible to look after ...

            I suspect few people have actually witnessed a "proper" drunk, and that is not a criticism as it's not something anyone should have to do. I've been "surprised" by just how much some of my friends change when intoxicated - not totally plastered as in your anecdotes, but just "had a few too many at the pub". Extrapolating to "totally plastered" I could easily see what a handful they'd be.

            > In the Linux world we all owed a great deal to Ian Murdock. It's very sad that he reached such an end and my sympathy goes out to everyone concerned, family, friends and, yes, police.

            +1 Also, why wasn't I surprised to see Aspergers listed in amongst his problems ? We "aspies" struggle with social interactions at the best of times, I hate to think how bad it gets when adding alcohol to the mix.

            Debian has been a big part of my career - it's sad to see it being highjacked as it is now.

            1. wolfetone Silver badge

              Re: With friends like that ...

              "I suspect few people have actually witnessed a "proper" drunk, and that is not a criticism as it's not something anyone should have to do. I've been "surprised" by just how much some of my friends change when intoxicated - not totally plastered as in your anecdotes, but just "had a few too many at the pub". Extrapolating to "totally plastered" I could easily see what a handful they'd be."

              Agree with this. In my experience* there are:

              - happy drunks

              - sleepy drunks

              - angry drunks

              For the most part happy and sleepy drunks are easy to deal with. Happy ones will annoy you at some point but they'll never look for trouble. Angry drunks though, you only have smile at them wrong and they'll try and swing for you. It's not a nice situation to have a grown adult in front of you who, lets face it when they're super drunk, to have all of the reasoning abilities of a 5 year old child.

              Sad news though. I know he was drunk, but even still if you're ever that low just ring someone. Anyone.

              1. wolfetone Silver badge

                Re: With friends like that ...

                *experience is 3 years as an Alcoholics Labourer at Wetherspoons, 11 years of drinking alcohol legally in public, 3 years of drinking alcohol illegally in public.

              2. Mark 85

                @wolftone -- Re: With friends like that ...

                There's another category... self-destructive drunks or maybe it's suicidal. Depressed and alcohol makes it worse.

                I've run into a couple of those over the years. They'll get drunk in a bar, go outside and proceed to bang their head on lampposts, etc. One I knew, fell on a fire hydrant (he had a history of self inflicted wounds while drinking - intentional not accidental wounding), then bashed his head on the pavement. Bystanders duly called an ambulance and the next day in the hospital, he claimed some cops beat him up. Witnesses and street CCTV showed no beatings. Only one cop showed up to take statements.

                The other one would run into the street in traffic and jump at the cars. Before he lost all driving privileges he wrecked 3 cars by driving them into brick walls.

              3. SomeoneInDelaware

                Re: With friends like that ...

                And then there are stupid drunks and dead drunks....

                Having been a volunteer firefighter/EMT/Fire policeman for 25 years, I've see quite a few of all five types.

          3. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: With friends like that ...

            Come to Canada and see how we deal with them.

            Again, I repeat to the far-too-many cop lovers here... NOT the cops, for sure.

      2. John Lilburne

        Re: With friends like that ...

        "Who would you send round if you didn't live within range?"

        Given that this is America someone from the gun range.

    3. cray74

      Re: With friends like that ...

      So, friends of a guy claiming he had been beaten up by the police called the police department to send a cop around to his house to check on him.

      You say that like they had a choice.

      Chances are the friends called 911 rather than directly calling the police. Every American kid from ages 3 or 4 onward knows 911, but few people know the local police force's direct line or even think of it in what they'd call an emergency. They dial 911.

      911 operators are not the police dispatchers, they're the general emergency services number. Based on the reported emergency, they may dispatch fire fighters, medical assistance, and/or police. Or rather, they'll contact the necessary service, explain the emergency, and the service will send assets as it thinks appropriate.

      There's some division** of labor in emergency services. Fire fighters might tear a building apart trying to battle fire but they're not going to raise a fire ax except in last-ditch self-defense, let alone try to (for example) apprehend a crazy arsonist or tackle an upset homeowner. They need to focus on fire fighting and life saving and have a sister service that is a full-time protective organization. Similarly, ambulance crews are not cross-trained SWAT team members, not when they can focus on life saving and leave protection to the police.

      As a result, when there's risk reported in the 911 call - like a house fire in a bad neighborhood where shooting firefighters is a sport - the 911 operators will either a) send both the cops and firefighters, or b) the fire fighters will note the neighborhood and call for a police escort.

      So, when someone calls up 911 and says, "My buddy in San Francisco is threatening self-harm and blaming police for troubles and ranting a lot," the 911 operator:

      1) Tries to figure out how to contact San Francisco emergency services, if they're not San Francisco's 911.

      2) Alerts emergency services, who will be either:

      2a) Police, since the first step is to gather information and police are the service trained for entry to environments made risky by humans, and they're the force trained for de-escalating situations made hostile by humans;

      2b) Medics**, who will probably note "disturbed individual threatening self harm," and request police assistance

      Or, hey, maybe the friends were knowledgeable, worried about police brutality, and called a San Francisco ambulance or fire service directly and said, "Hey, my friend's acting weird, threatening self-harm." Guess who that service is going to call for assistance? The police.

      There's a lot of paths that lead to emergency services responding to someone like Ian Murdock, and most of them pick up police assistance along the way. Don't blame Mr. Murdock's friends for that.

      ************************************

      **I say "some" division, because there's sometimes a lot of overlap between fire and paramedic/ambulance services. In the regions of the US I'm familiar with, fire services usually provide faster and more extensive first response medical care than ambulance services, and have many more tools to extract you from - say - a collapsed home or massive highway pile-up.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    1. AndyS

      Not very sensitive.

      1. bombastic bob Silver badge

        "Not very sensitive."

        Ugh... the 's' word 'sensitive'. Almost as bad as the 'f' word 'feel'.

        'Sensitive' is *HIGHLY* overrated. snarky irreverant comedy, on the other hand...

        Still not happy to see someone so accomplished and intelligent driven by some kind of apparent mental disorder to the point of suicide.

    2. Zolko Silver badge

      he was the founder

      rm -rf

      sudo for sure in this case

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Selfish

    I can well understand that it's not easy if you suffer from depressions, and so it shouldn't come as a surprise that some people will try to drink it away.

    But I do think that you're pretty selfish if you drink excessively whilst knowing that you'll end up being a total pain in the ass for your peers and surrounding. Sure, life can suck and as said I can well understand that's not always easy to cope. But that should be no excuse, what so ever, to get yourself into such states where you now start to make other peoples live miserable. Especially if you know that you can't handle it.

    It is a tragedy, I definitely don't deny that, and this is even more so for his family and next of kin. But having said that I still stand by my opinion: if you drink while knowing that you'll end up terrorizing the people around you then you're a very selfish S.O.B. in my book, no matter who you are or what status you might have achieved.

    1. Triggerfish

      Re: Selfish

      Well it depends really. There are some who turn to arseholes when they are drunks, we had a friend like it, perfectly nice guy but beer would mean a fight was going to happen. We banned him from alchohol when out with us.

      However there are some people who drink because its basically a medical issue, someone with depression drinking, it would not suprise me if thats more someone self medicating. That's a lot lot harder to stop.

      It's quite easy to say no excuse what so ever but thats from the perspective of someone who is not suffering, and because it involves mental issues it does not seem so obvious.it's a bit like someone healthy criticising someone with no legs for not going for a healthy jog in the morning.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Selfish

      I really hope you never have depression. Depression is not about life sucking, and you're not always acting rationally when you are depressed. I can well understand why someone who's depressed chooses to drink - because it helps them feel better, at least for a while, because it helps them forget or numbs the pain, because it lets them feel something besides despair for a while.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        @AC

        "because it helps them feel better, at least for a while"

        And in that moment of reality they place their own problems above those of the others. It's not as if depressed people hold a patent on being unhappy.

        Life means you have choices which you can make. And you can also chose not to drink and instead try to seek help. Yeah, and now things become blurred.

        Friends abandoned you? That only tells me one thing: you never told them about who you really were so they only saw the bad side. And that is also why I saw what I said above: because I can recognize myself in that story as well. A lot of people (not all!) don't speak up, they don't try to get help, they just suffocate themselves in their own world without stopping to think for one second what their actions means for those around them.

        You can't blame everything on "it made me do it", there must come a time where you need to accept the consequences of your own actions.

        Yet this seems modern society right now: "Me, myself and I" and who cares about the rest. And when it involves a somewhat famous person: how dare you criticize them?

        So please guys: the next time you're in a bar and this total *hat comes up to you and insults you and your girlfriend and then tries to start a fight: don't fight him off. He could be simply depressed and yeah: you try dealing with that.

        Sounds bizarre? Try telling that to Ian's neighbors who had to rely on the police dozens of times.

        Because THAT is what most people easily forget.

  4. Farmer Geddon
    WTF?

    No offence to anyone but do we really need to see the details of his post-mortem examination to grasp that he killed himself? Maybe the availability of these lurid details are everday fare in the USA but personally I find this kind of intrusive rubber-necking in poor taste.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      To be fair, I think it brings closure where earlier reports left it open (i.e. mysterious circumstances and police brutality). Of course those inclined to conspiracy theories will still believe what they want regardless.

      1. Farmer Geddon
        Unhappy

        I appreciate that, but closure to whom exactly? The cause of death would only be relevant to those close to him if they had concerns about misadventure.

        Accepting that he had already alienated many close to him, for those who still had any attachment to him, having the intimate anatomical findings of the Pathologist spread far and wide would surely be distressing?

        Or perhaps I am just out of sync with what passes as normal these days.

  5. Stevie

    Bah!

    Mixing Aspberger's with an addictive personality disorder and you have the recipe for an unhappy life.

    Reading the subtext it would seem that the man had few people left in his life who gave a damn, he having alienated his friends and neighbours to the point they would avoid him.

    Sad. I am currently enjoying evangelizing the Pi3 as a proper work desktop computer to anyone too slow to get out of range and would have liked to thank him for doing the heavy lifting of the end-user experience.

    1. bombastic bob Silver badge

      Re: Bah!

      "Mixing Aspberger's with an addictive personality disorder and you have the recipe for an unhappy life."

      Ass-burger's. What a CROCK of CRAP *that* is. It used to be called 'absent-minded professor' or 'genius personality'. It's when you are SO smart, that stupid things like "emotional sensitivity" are _ignored_, because they _should_ be. But, whatever. Let's just call 'genius' a 'disorder' now, so we can make morons "feel better" about themselves. HAH!

      That being said, your psychological diagnosis is rather narrow. What drove Ian to suicide is most likely a LOT more complex. If he was making delusional reports about police brutality, it might be an indicator of a LOT of different things, from tumors and chemical imbalances to an underlying psychosis of some kind that went undetected for a long time.

      Or... MAYBE he started on some kind of treatment that caused it? Nobody's said ANYTHING about that, and I've heard (from people who know, in the media) that certain kinds of mental disorders (that require medication) being treated by the WRONG STUFF can cause suicidal tendencies and delusions and things of that nature. And shrinks "go shopping" to find the 'right' treatment, more often than not.

      Personally, I think TRUE genius is a hair's width from insanity, anyway. So there you go.

      1. ThomH

        Re: Bah!

        I'm nothing like an expert, but I once dated someone who was and my recollection is that Asperger's didn't make it from DSM-IV to DSM-V on account of being insufficiently well-defined, and in any case was never strongly correlated with intelligence, it also not being a contributor to diagnosis.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: Bah!

          my recollection is that Asperger's didn't make it from DSM-IV to DSM-V on account of being insufficiently well-defined, and in any case was never strongly correlated with intelligence, it also not being a contributor to diagnosis.

          However, if you look at the better comedians, you can see a well above average occurrence of bipolar disorders. Off the top of my head, Spike Milligan, Peter Sellers and Stephen Fry are classic examples of that, and I'm now wondering if the late Robin Williams had it too (insert a minute silence here - remembering his passing still brings sadness). Peter Seller's problems with relationships are worth a study all on its own. In that context it's interesting that most of these people wouldn't want a cure as the 'highs' are worth the price of having VERY deep lows.

          In any case, my experience is that people with a different world view and/or "genius genes" tend to exhibit atypical behaviour, or rather a-normal (as opposed to abnormal which has unhelpful connotations). Personally, I enjoy eccentricity where it isn't harmful or dangerous.

          People with depression need help, but don't always realise their issue is depression. The awareness campaigns over the years have helped a bit but there is still the barrier of the associated stigma to overcome.

          As for "how far would you go for a friend with suicidal tendencies" - I didn't travel, but I was called by friends when someone I knew was standing blind drunk in the window and didn't want to come away from there (due to clear intentions). I talked this person out of the window in the hands of others who could then get busy with dealing with the drama that made suicide appear a viable decision. At the time, I was in London, and the person involved was in Sydney. Happy end here: this was 30+ years ago and this person is still around :).

          I have mixed feelings about Asperger's. It is a known issue, even if the definition is still vague (also because the norm for "normal" isn't a stable one), but I'm uncomfortable with that becoming "fashionable" or a defence for aberrant behaviour such as hacking. With all due respect, someone with Aspergers DOES know right from wrong (often more rigidly than a non-Aspie), and I find it a bit insulting to all other Asperger-affected people who do stick to what is right or not.

      2. Stevie

        Re: Bah! 4 BlitheringBob

        TAKE YOUR MEDS!

  6. Mikel

    An excess of passion is often self destructive. It seemed to drive the creativity and work that made so much great stuff while he was able, but it was too much. He gave us a lot. Thanks, Ian.

  7. ecofeco Silver badge

    Seems obvious he needed mental help

    All those descriptions seem indicate a rapid mental breakdown due to a physical illness or disease.

    Sad. Just sad.

  8. energystar
    Windows

    So sad the man went down unacknowledged...

    On putting my aluminum foil hat: Those e-comms sound manipulated, clipped also. Can't feel less that Ian was up to some point, disposed off.

    1. energystar
      Windows

      Asperger...

      Asperger needs of a strong circle of family [or friends]. Ironic would result that economic success ripped Him from that.

  9. yorkee

    Such an accomplished ,productive,and selfless individual. What drove him to drinking and suicide besides Asperger ? Run-inns with police and neighbors. An incomparable tragedy I have trouble accepting in our day and age. Rest in Peace.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Should have been Poettering instead. :-(

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    weird sh*t happens all the time

    falling down stairs, landing on some misplaced bullets, etc.

    Lots of people in the Bay Area who made a lot of money real fast and don;t know how to manage it.

    Organized crime of varying ethnic backgrounds that have handled "the underground" for better part of a century continuous.

    Naive tech types who buy into the "California Kumbaya" and don't realize that a) there ARE lots of dangerous and manipulative people and b) trusting everyone is a fool's mistake.

    Got some quick easy loans from "the community" because you've been told to hate "banksters" and then find out the interest rate is more than linux consulting fees cover? Upset some psycho who has been riled up about "gentrification" and blames losing her rent controlled apartment on the "rich tech bro" and calls up someone to "do something"?

    Shakedown from guys claiming to be cops? or maybe some bad ones of the Senator Leland Yee type? You never know. Sometimes, the outrageous stories are actually true.

    "Politicians leaving recording devices in the headquarters of their opponents? that could never happen in real life!" as a common example.

  12. shovelDriver

    Just Some Questions

    From the article: "the officer could see the open-source guru lying face down on his stairs. The cop kicked down the locked front door, and found Murdock naked and lifeless with electrical cord around his neck."

    OK.

    Was there a place where he tied off the electrical cord; balcony, stair railing, overhead light fixture . . . showing abrasion from the wire? Possibly a piece of the electrical cord still hanging? Or not?

    Any suicide note?

    Is this indicative of incom . . . plete investigating, or of the usual piss-poor reporting?

    1. Ramazan

      Re: Just Some Questions

      "Was there a place where he tied off the electrical cord; balcony, stair railing, overhead light fixture . . . showing abrasion from the wire? Possibly a piece of the electrical cord still hanging? Or not?"

      There's a link to PDF report in the article; on its page 4 it says a vacuum cleaner was fixed at the top of stairs and vacuum cleaner cord around Ian's neck.

  13. Crazy Operations Guy

    " his girlfriend at the time, Debra Lynn, was the Deb. "

    Naming a large project after someone is much like getting a tattoo with their name on it. In bad relationships, it'll be over quickly but you still have to work on the project; in a serious and fulfilling relationship, it'll just hurt that much more in the rare chance you split up. Plus it will just complicate future relationships, as they would be a bit curious as to why they haven't changed the name.

    Learned that the hard way some time ago when I named a business after my significant other at the time. Took a serious mental toll on me while I tried to get the company renamed and keep in contact with my previous customers and re-assuring them that there was no reason to be concerned over the name.

    With Ian's condition, having his most famous work associated with the mother of his children must have taken a serious mental toll on him, and most certainly didn't do him any favors.

    1. Ramazan
      Facepalm

      Re: " his girlfriend at the time, Debra Lynn, was the Deb. "

      Naming a US Aircraft Carrier Ship after Theodore Roosevelt was presumably too like getting a tattoo with their name?

  14. Adrian Midgley 1

    Alas.

    In the UK there would be an inquest, and the Coroner would take some interest in healthcare provision to someone who had been arrested.

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