David A. Kennedy

Birth Name:

David Anthony Kennedy

Birth Date:

June 15, 1955

Birth Place:

Washington D. C.

Death Date:

April 25, 1984

Place of Death:

The Brazilian Court Hotel & Beach Club, Room 107, Palm Beach, Florida

Age:

Cause of Death:

Drug overdose - cocaine

Cemetery Name:

Holyhood Cemetery

Claim to Fame:

Historical Figure

Associates:

David Kennedy was the was the fourth of eleven children to Senator Robert F. Kennedy and Ethel Skakel Kennedy who had led a deeply troubled life since witnessing the assassination of his father on live TV as he was waiting for his father upstairs at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. In the spring of 1984, Kennedy completed a month-long stay at St. Mary's Hospital and Rehabilitation Center in Minneapolis. He flew down to Palm Beach, Florida, on April 19 for Easter, where several members of the Kennedy family had gathered. Kennedy checked into room 107 of the Brazilian Court Hotel and spent the next few days partying. On April 25th, at the insistence of concerned family members, staff went to check on his welfare and found him dead on the floor of his suite. An autopsy determined he had died on April 25, 1984, of an overdose of cocaine, the tranquilizer Mellaril, and the painkiller Demerol.

And The Hits Keep Coming …

In August 1973, a Jeep David’s brother Joseph P. Kennedy II was driving on Nantucket overturned, fracturing one of his brother David Kennedy’s vertebrae and permanently paralyzing David’s girlfriend, Pam Kelley. The police cited Kennedy with reckless driving and fined him $100. The Kennedy auto insurance paid for Kelley’s initial medical treatment and while the Kennedy family only made a small contribution to her continued care during the years following the accident. In true Kennedy fashion Joseph never took responsibility for the accident or the pain and suffering that occurred afterwards. Kelley died on November 20, 2020, almost 50 years after the accident.

Despite just finishing another month-long stint in rehab and a lifetime addiction to heroin, alcohol and other drugs, several of the Kennedy family including Douglas Kennedy told investigators that they saw David taking what they thought were sleeping pills in his hotel room Saturday night, April 19. And on April 22, Douglas said, ‘He was drinking most of the day. But in the morning, I suspected him (to be) on cocaine. He was jumpy, paranoid and … he was just licking his lips.’

David was the first of four of Joseph Kennedy’s grandchildren to die prematurely. Subsequently, her younger brother Michael died in a skiing accident, her cousins John Jr. in a plane crash and Kara died of a heart attack .

Cemetery Information:

Final Resting Place:

Holyhood Cemetery

584 Heath Street

Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts, 02467

USA

North America

Map:

Map of Holyhood Cemetery in Brookline, Massachusetts

Grave Location:

Cushing Knoll, Kennedy Family Plot

Grave Location Description

As you enter the cemetery, turn right and stay on Cross Or Western Avenue until it ends. Turn left and then a right on Carroll Avenue. Carroll Avenue turns into O’Connell Avenue and eventually ends right in front of the large Kennedy Memorial, visible on the corner.