The mystery surrounding actress Natalie Wood’s drowning death 43 years ago has been blown wide open by stunning new evidence that points directly at her hot-tempered husband, Robert Wagner.
Two new witnesses made shocking confessions saying that Wood was abused by the hot Hart to Hart star and was screaming for her life before she disappeared from the yacht Splendour off Catalina Island, California, on November 28, 1981, around 11 p.m.
In a special interview with RadarOnline.com, author Marti Rulli said she thinks the new evidence will lead to a grand jury investigation that will finally charge Wagner, who is 94 years old.
Rulli said, “The case will stay open as long as Robert Wagner is alive because he is the suspect.” She plans to write about the new witness testimony in her next book, Natalie Wood and the Devil She Knew.
“I still hold hope the Los Angeles DA will see fit to let the strong previous evidence, and the new evidence I have gathered, bring justice for Natalie’s murder.”
When the case was looked into again in 2011, new witnesses came forward. The next year, the Los Angeles County coroner changed the cause of death from “accidental drowning” to “drowning and other undetermined factors.”
“The witnesses did not speak out sooner because the case was quickly ruled an accident, so they did not pay attention to what they saw or heard,” Rulli, who wrote the book Goodbye Natalie, Goodbye Splendour with the yacht’s captain Dennis Davern, explained.
An American man, 17 years old, who worked on a fishing boat docked near the Splendour called Rulli last year because Natalie’s screams were still haunting him.
Rulli said, “It still bothers him, and he wanted to tell me what he knew.” He asked that we not reveal the witness’s name.
I asked him what he heard, and he said he heard Natalie screaming, which made him feel bad. He did not tell the police, though, because he thought it was a clear case of drowning.
Davern told police that the Thanksgiving weekend cruise turned violent when Wagner accused Wood, 43, of having an affair with Christopher Walken, who was also on the yacht and co-starred with her in Brainstorm. The man’s claim backs up what Davern said.
Davern says that a raging There was a fight between Wagner and Wood right before she left. Wagner broke a bottle of wine on a table.
David heard Wagner yell, “Get off my f***ing boat!” at one point.
Davern said Wagner would not let him turn on the searchlights or call for help until four hours after Wood had gone missing. The next morning, her badly hurt body was found on land next to an inflatable dinghy.
A dying 80-year-old woman also called Rulli and said she worked with Wood in the 1960s and saw Wagner hit the West Side Story sweetheart out of anger. “She said she saw Wagner come into their dressing room additional evidence of abuse!”
Wagner’s lawyers strongly deny that he had anything to do with Natalie’s death, but RadarOnline.com has learned that another witness called the police and said he lived next door to the famous couple in the 1950s.
“He remembers Natalie banging on the door in the middle of the night” , Rulli said. “She was asking for a place to stay for the night because [Wagner] was going to kill her!
