The 80s teen movie star Amanda Peterson died as a result of an accidental overdose after ingesting a deadly combination of drugs, according to an official coroner’s report seen by the TMZ website.
Peterson, who was briefly a star name in Hollywood following her turn as an Arizona cheerleader in the 1987 romantic comedy Can’t Buy Me Love, was found dead at her home in Greeley, Colorado, on 5 July. The 43-year-old was 16 when she starred opposite Patrick Dempsey as high school student Cindy Mancini, who agrees to feign a relationship with a local “nerd” for $1,000.
A report from the Weld county coroner in Colorado said substances found in Peterson’s system following a post-mortem examination included pain relief substance gabapentin, the anti-anxiety medication benzodiazepine, the anti-psychotic drug phenothiazine, and opiates and marijuana. The coroner, who concluded the former actor was “naive to opiates”, judged her death to be a result of a “morphine effect” which caused respiratory failure.
Twice-married Peterson, who struggled to find acting work after the success of her breakthrough role, was likely self-medicating to control pain, according to the toxicology report. A week before her death, she had told a confidante that she had obtained morphine-based medicines from friends. The actor’s father said in the wake of his daughter’s death that she suffered from health issues including sleep apnea, pneumonia and sinusitis.
Peterson retired from acting more than two decades ago at the age of 23; her final screen credit was the 1994 film Windrunner. The actor’s CV also includes a brief appearance, aged nine, in 1982’s Annie, as well as turns in the 80s films Explorers, The Lawless Land and Listen to Me, and TV shows A Year in the Life and Doogie Howser, MD.
