Top FIVE reasons to re-open the Natalie Wood Case.

I've deducted the top reasons to re-open the Natalie Wood Case down to five. I've explained as briefly as possible in categories the details of why the case warrants another look. Also, a top-5 list works better for the new foreword for "Goodbye Natalie Goodbye Splendour" and for media releases. Please look these over: your comments are welcomed. Thank you for all the comments in helping me to construct and condense this list, a difficult thing to do because the case is so complicated in spite of the fact it's so simple to recognize that the intitial investigation was botched!

1) Dennis Davern, former Splendour captain, is the only witness to the immediate circumstances surrounding Wood's disappearance. He has offered to testify under penalty of perjury in a court of law that the three survivors of the November 1981 cruise aboard Splendour—Robert Wagner, Christopher Walken, and Dennis Davern—all lied to authorities at the scene of Natalie Wood’s death. Dennis Davern has passed a certified polygraph test, including his vital claim that Robert Wagner was with Natalie Wood as they argued on the back deck of the yacht when she went missing. Wagner claimed at the death scene he had no idea how his wife and dinghy went missing. Wagner's initial vague statements are inconsistent with his later admitting his angry smashing of a wine bottle just prior to Natalie’s “disappearance.” Christopher Walken also witnessed the bottle smashing but has never admitted to it. The arguing and violence shortly before Wood’s absence changes the dynamics of the mood initially described aboard the Splendour. There was absolutely no interrogating of surviving witnesses, nor body checks to determine any bruising consistent with Wood’s body bruises.


2) There was never an effort to pursue how Wood received over 25 body wounds and bruises, nor an official effort to determine how or why she had left the yacht. The Chief Coroner, Thomas Noguchi, was fired for offering valid information to the public. Wood’s cause of death was moted as accidental drowning instead of “undetermined” as would have fit the known--and unknown--information  properly. There had been a rush to close the case to avoid valid media questions. Noguchi’s theory claimed Natalie's down jacket weighed her down. In fact, down jackets serve as buoyant life preservers and when wet weigh considerably less than Noguchi speculated. Noguchi theorized Natalie kicked toward shore and became bruised trying to mount a dinghy, yet she was found wearing socks. One simple “sock test” proves the improbability of Noguchi's theory. Wood's body bruises are consistent with domestic abuse.

3) Key witnesses were ignored by case detectives. Marilyn Wayne, moored next to the Splendour, could have offered vital information crucial to establishing a timeline that was never officially composed. Wayne was never interviewed by authorities even after calling and offering her account. Roger Smith, the Coast Guard Lieutenant who retrieved Wood’s body was never interviewed and was quickly transferred and demoted after being vocal about the Wood case. Former lead detectives in the case, Duane Rasure and Frank Salerno, refuse to accept and to report new, verifiable, vital information pertaining to Wood's death.

4) There was a drastic delay in calling for help from aboard the Splendour after Natalie was no longer on board. Wagner and Davern were fully aware of Natalie’s absence from approximately 11:05 P.M. on, yet a ship-to-shore, local call was not placed until 1:30 A.M. and the Coast Guard was not called until 3:30 A.M., a complete violation of maritime protocol. Davern wanted to call for help immediately but was forbidden by Wagner to do so. This inexcusable delay in reporting a person missing from a yacht was never officially examined.

5) The "banging dinghy theory" (what has become the unofficial explanation for Wood’s death) is a senseless theory, and can easily be proven invalid. The dinghy was tied securely at the STERN, with two lines. No questions were asked about dinghy procedure. Wagner has never volunteered the fact that the use of the yacht's swim step is unnecessary in securing a dinghy. Instead, he promoted the theory that Natalie, a woman deathly afraid of water, was in her nightclothes on a dark swim step performing a boat chore. There was no official effort to determine how, when, and by whom Splendour’s dinghy was released. Instead, the death scene was compromised. The dinghy was handled after being found, and detectives left Splendour under the watch of a restaurant owner. The restaurant owner and his employee entered and used Splendour while it should have been considered a sealed-off crime scene until determined otherwise. The master stateroom aboard the Splendour, despite being in peculiar disarray, was compromised rather than scrutinized.