Las Vegas Sun

April 18, 2024

Police release incident report, 911 call in Danny Gans death

Danny Gans

Leila Navidi

Danny Gans shown performing on March 20.

Updated Thursday, June 25, 2009 | 11:59 a.m.

Audio Clip

  • Listen to the call between Julia Gans and the 911 operator.

Danny Gans

Singer, impressionist and comedian Danny Gans, shown performing at the Encore Theatre on March 20, died suddenly Friday at his home in Henderson. Launch slideshow »

Julia Gans, the wife of Las Vegas entertainer Danny Gans, awoke early on the morning of May 1 to realize that her husband was no longer snoring, according to an incident report and 911 recording released this morning from the Henderson Police Department.

At about 6 p.m. the night before she had asked her son to get the entertainer for dinner, but he heard his father snoring and decided not to wake him up.

Four hours later she went to the master bedroom and found Gans asleep in bed on his back with his feet slightly elevated, the report indicated.

Gans was still snoring and Julia Gans thought nothing of it since he often snored when he slept. Hours later at 3:40 a.m., she woke up and realized he wasn't snoring.

Julia Gans remains composed on the 911 call as she realizes that her 52-year-old husband is not breathing.

"My husband’s not, um, I can’t seem to wake him up," she tells the operator.

When asked to explain what happened, Julia Gans said she's not sure.

"He was sleeping really heavily and I was just laying here and all of a sudden, the breathing kind of like, just stopped and I came over to try and wake him up and I can’t wake him up," Gans said.

Julia Gans couldn't tell if he was breathing or if he had a pulse. She immediately called 911 and was given instructions on how to administer CPR. She pulled Gans off the bed, put him on the floor and performed CPR until Henderson police arrived. Gans never awoke.

Julia Gans told Henderson Police investigators that at the direction of the police she had gathered and placed all of her husband's medications so they could be examined.

Henderson Police collected the evidence and noted nothing remarkable about the number of pills that were found and counted, the report said.

The coroner's investigators examined Gans' body and noticed that his faced was swollen and red. They found nothing during the examination that suggested foul play.

Clark County Coroner Mike Murphy announced earlier this month that Gans died because of toxic levels of hydromorphone — best known as Dilaudid — in conjunction with other medical conditions.

The impressionist headlined at the Encore.

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