15 Baby Stars Who Died Tragically Younger

Malcolm-Jamal Warner

The previous Cosby Present star died on July 20, 2025 throughout a household journey to Costa Rica after the actor was “apparently swept away by a present,” in response to an announcement given to PEOPLE. Two days later, The Judicial Investigation Company (OIJ) confirmed that his reason behind dying was unintended asphyxiation by submersion.

Following his early success on The Cosby Present, on which he starred from 1984 to 1992, Warner’s profession continued to flourish with roles in Malcolm & Eddie, Reed Between the Strains, Main Crimes, Fits, The Resident and most not too long ago, 9-1-1 and Alert: Lacking Individuals Unit.

Warner is survived by a spouse and daughter, whose identities he saved personal.

Corey Haim

After touchdown his first film function as a teen in Firstborn reverse Sarah Jessica Parker and Robert Downey Jr., Haim went on to look in movies like Lucas, Murphy’s Romance, The Misplaced Boys and License to Drive.

He and his greatest good friend Corey Feldman — the pair was dubbed the “Two Coreys” — starred in eight motion pictures collectively, even signing on to do a actuality present collectively in 2007 known as The Two Coreys that explored the pair’s expertise with drug habit.

Not lengthy after their sequence resulted in 2008, Haim died at 38 from pneumonia.

Brad Renfro

Renfro made his film debut in 1994 within the movie The Consumer with Tommy Lee Jones and Susan Sarandon.

“I’m actually fortunate to like what I do and receives a commission for it,” he advised PEOPLE when he was named one in every of PEOPLE’s “High 30 Underneath 30.” “I’d do it at no cost if it’s good.”

Following The Consumer, Renfro appeared in motion pictures similar to Tom and Huck and Sleepers. Amid his success onscreen, Renfro discovered himself in hassle with the legislation, getting arrested for possession of cocaine and marijuana at age 16 in 1998.

Whereas he advised PEOPLE he was “glad I received arrested, as a result of it taught me so much,” he was arrested and sentenced to 2 years probation in 2000 for allegedly attempting to steal a 45-foot yacht in Fort Lauderdale, Florida with a good friend and 5 years later, charged with driving underneath the affect. Later in 2005, he was caught in a police sting and charged with a felony rely of making an attempt to own heroin, later pleading responsible to the cost and coming into rehab.

Renfro died in 2008, which was later dominated an accident and attributed to “acute heroin/morphine intoxication.”

Dana Plato

Simply over a decade after Plato’s eight-season run on Diff’hire Strokes, the actress died in Could 1999 at 33  from a drug overdose that was later dominated a suicide. She died solely a day after she advised Howard Stern in an interview that she was clear.

Plato had confronted points with medicine for years and in 1991 was arrested for robbing a video retailer at gunpoint.

In honor of what would have been her fifty fifth birthday, her former Diff’hire Strokes costar Todd Bridges known as Plato “one in every of my greatest mates.”

“I’ll always remember you and love you eternally. HAPPY BIRTHDAY Dana Plato R.I.P you’re free my good friend,” he wrote.

Gary Coleman

Plato’s Diff’hire Strokes costar Gary Coleman, who starred on the present from ages 10 to 18, additionally died in tragic circumstances after he sustained a mind hemorrhage in 2010 at 42. His ex-wife, Shannon Worth, claimed he fell, although household and mates suspected she had one thing to do with it, regardless of police saying there was no proof of foul play.

15 years later, Worth took a voluntary lie detector take a look at as a part of A&E’s new sequence, Lie Detector: Fact or Deception, the place she was requested concerning the occasions surrounding Coleman’s dying. When Worth denied if she ever struck Coleman throughout their relationship or if she withheld assist to him following his fall, the take a look at discovered her solutions “inconclusive.” (In a recording of the 911 name reporting the incident, Worth might be heard refusing to hearken to the operator’s directions to assist him.)

“So far as rendering assist, I may have helped him a bit bit extra,” Worth says on the A&E episode.

When she insisted that she didn’t bodily trigger Coleman’s fall, the take a look at mentioned there was “deception indicated.”

Lee Thompson Younger

Greater than a decade after enjoying the titular character on Disney Channel’s The Well-known Jett Jackson, Lee Thompson Younger died on the age of 29 in 2013, NBC Information reported.

The Los Angeles County coroner later disclosed that he died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound and had been taking treatment to deal with melancholy, per the outlet.

Following his time on the Disney Channel present, Younger went on to land roles in Friday Evening Lights and Rizzoli & Isles — his final onscreen credit score earlier than his dying.

Cameron Boyce

Cameron Boyce had made his mark as a Disney Channel celebrity earlier than his life was minimize quick at 20. The actor, who starred within the Descendants franchise together with the Disney present Jessie, died in his sleep on July 6, 2019. His household advised PEOPLE on the time in an announcement that his dying “was resulting from a seizure because of an ongoing medical situation, and that situation was epilepsy.”

His household began the nonprofit Cameron Boyce Basis following his dying, that honors Boyce “by aiming to remedy epilepsy by means of funding analysis, training and consciousness campaigns whereas nonetheless supporting causes that have been essential to Cameron.”

Jonathan Brandis

Brandis had solidified his standing as a teen heartthrob within the Nineteen Nineties with roles in The NeverEnding Story II: The Subsequent Chapter, Ladybugs and seaQuest DSV. He continued performing into the late ’90s and early aughts however in 2003, the 27-year-old died by suicide.

Jaleel White, who had not too long ago filmed a pilot with Brandis for 111 Gramercy Park, writes in his guide Rising Up Urkel that his good friend’s dying felt like “a fallen soldier.”

“I think about that Jonathan felt he wanted that pilot to feed his soul,” White wrote. “I’ve by no means identified an actor to ask me repeatedly about our pickup prospects the best way he did after we shot 111 Gramercy Park. He was as a lot a veteran performer as I, our prospects for pickup ought to have been as clear to him as they have been to me. It appeared to me that Jonathan, very like myself, had come to a different profession crossroads and 111 Gramercy Park would have provided him an sincere probability at leading-man standing.”

Brandis’ father later advised PEOPLE that he believed his son had unaddressed psychological sickness.

“Jonathan was very sensible and he was very well mannered and at all times easygoing,” his father Greg Brandis advised PEOPLE. “In a tragic approach, he was in all probability bipolar. [His death] wasn’t because of the leisure business. I look again now, and in his 20s, he confirmed indicators of manic melancholy. I hope that anybody struggling can go get assist.”

Aaron Carter

Carter turned a family identify within the late ’90s and early 2000s as a pop star — releasing his first album at simply 10 years previous. Throughout his early profession, Aaron opened on tour for each the Backstreet Boys (a gaggle that features his brother Nick) and Britney Spears.

Later in life, Aaron was open about his struggles with habit, substance abuse and steel well being and sought therapy on a number of events. On a 2019 episode of The Docs, he shared: “The official prognosis is that I undergo from a number of persona dysfunction, schizophrenia, acute nervousness; I am manic depressive.”

Aaron turned a dad in 2021, welcoming son son Prince with Melanie Martin and continued making music, releasing LØVË in 2018 and Blacklisted in 2022. However, on the morning on November 5, 2022 he was discovered lifeless in a bath in his California dwelling.

Months later, the Los Angeles Nation Medical Examiner-Coroner reported that the 34-year-old had drowned after inhaling difluoroethane [a gas usually found in cans of compressed air] and taking alprazolam [a generic name for Xanax].

Anton Yelchin

After shifting to L.A. from Leningrad, Soviet Union at six months previous, Yelchin kicked off his performing profession at a younger age, touchdown his first onscreen function in E.R. in 2000. A yr later he appeared alongside Hope Davis and Anthony Hopkins in 2001’s Hearts in Atlantis at 11 years previous. Nevertheless his breakout function got here in 2007’s Charlie Bartlett and he later stared in J.J. Abram’s 2009 Star Trek reboot as Pavel Chekov.

He continued performing into the 2010s earlier than a freak accident killed the actor at his dwelling in 2016. Yelchin died at simply 27 after his Jeep rolled backward and pinned him to the driveway gate.

“I’m devastated, a world with out Anton is a lesser place,” Felicity Jones, Yelchin’s costar within the 2011 drama Like Loopy, mentioned in an announcement following his dying. “He touched everybody he met along with his honesty and humanity, we have now misplaced a novel and profound soul.”

Sawyer Sweeten

Audiences met Sweeten in 1996 when he landed the function of Ray Romano’s onscreen son, Geoffrey, in Everyone Loves Raymond. His actual life brother and sister performed his siblings on the present as effectively. He performed the character for all 9 seasons of the sequence, and per IMDB, it was his final onscreen credit score.

At 19, Sweeten died by suicide on April 23, 2015 whereas visiting household in Texas.

“I’m shocked and terribly saddened by the information about Sawyer,” Romano mentioned in an announcement launched to PEOPLE on the time. “He was a beautiful and candy child to be round. Only a nice power every time he was there. My coronary heart breaks for him, his household and his mates throughout this very troublesome time.”

4 years after his dying, his household by means of the Sawyer Sweeten Basis — together with Romano and his spouse Anna in addition to Phil Rosenthal, who created Everyone Loves Raymond, and his household — got here collectively to dedicate a theater in Sawyer’s identify.

Heather O’Rourke

O’Rourke landed the function of Carol Anne Freeling in 1982’s Poltergeist earlier than showing in tasks together with Blissful Days, The New Depart it to Beaver and the horror movie’s two sequels. Although earlier than Poltergeist III premiered in June 1988, O’Rourke died at a San Diego hospital in February 1988 resulting from intestinal stenosis, the L.A. Occasions reported a the time. She was 12.

Judith Barsi

Barsi had roles in Jaws: The Revenge, The Land Earlier than Time, All Canines Go to Heaven and Rising Pains (seen right here, proper) as a younger, rising star in Hollywood. At 10 years previous, Judith and her mom, Maria Barsi, have been murdered by the younger actress’ father József Barsi of their dwelling in 1988. He shot each his spouse and daughter earlier than lighting the home on fireplace and turning the gun on himself.

József allegedly had a historical past of abuse and in 1986, Maria had reported her husband’s threats to the Los Angeles County Division of Youngsters’s Companies. The case was closed after police discovered no seen accidents and Maria opted to not prosecute.

Kevin Clark

Practically 20 years after starring as Freddy Jones, the child drummer, in 2003’s Faculty of Rock, Kevin Clark was struck by a automobile whereas using his bike in Chicago in the course of the early hours of Could 26, 2021.

Following the information of the 32-year-old’s dying, the film’s star Jack Black shared two photographs with Clark to his Instagram alongside the caption: “Devastating information. Kevin is gone. Manner too quickly. Lovely soul. So many nice recollections. Heartbroken. Sending like to his household and the entire Faculty of Rock group.”

Clark had continued his profession in music into maturity and most not too long ago was part of the band Jessie Bess and the Intentions, which had its first present simply earlier than the accident, per the Chicago Solar-Occasions.