Post date: Feb 22, 2012 4:36:39 PM
KAMPALA, UGANDA (FEBRUARY 22, 2012) (REUTERS - Jeff Rice, a freelance producer for popular U.S. reality TV show, The Amazing Race, was found dead on Saturday (February 18) in his Kampala hotel room in unexplained circumstances.
TV producer for U.S. reality TV show, the Amazing Race, found dead in his hotel room. Assistant remains in a coma.
His assistant, Catherine Fuller was also found in the same room in a coma, before being hospitalised in the Ugandan capital.
Police initially suspected poisoning but a post mortem report also raised the possibility of choking as cause of death.
"As I talk, we have already obtained the post-mortem report from Mulago hospital and we are only waiting for the toxicological analysis which we are expecting any time today. Our earlier suspicion was that they could have been poisoned, but the post mortem report shows there could have been some problem of choking. We are only wondering how two people could be choked by food at the same time," Ibin Senkumbi, Kampala Metropolitan Police spokesman told Reuters TV on Wednesday (February 22).
The Daily Monitor, reported on their website the cause of death was a cocaine overdose, but Senkumbi said although a white substance had been found in Rice's hotel room, the investigation was still ongoing.
"However our search of the room where they were staying revealed some white substance in powder form which has also been submitted to government analyst to help us in finding out what exactly it is, though the suspicion is it could be one of the illicit drugs, so we shall also need to find out if has any link to what exactly happened," he said.
Rice and his assistant were not working on The Amazing Race at the time of his death, but had helped with creating challenges across Africa for the current season.