PREACH IT! The Gary Coleman mess: We didn’t know we could cringe any harder

Gary Coleman still isn’t interred.

The stubborn delays in funeral arrangements have triggered two rather inconvenient side effects: (1) sanctimonious fans leaping onto the Intertubes to condemn reporters for not “letting him rest in peace” -- as if Coleman is hovering over a laptop somewhere, weeping over every word -- and (2) heavy exposure to spokespeople who really love exclamation points. (I recently reached out to a rep for Shannon Price, Coleman’s ex, to ask about what kinds of assets the actor may have left behind. The five-sentence response included four exclamation points. We now know that “Gary and Shannon were very happy in the end!”)

The latest in the Coleman burial saga? Radar Online is reporting that the mortuary holding Coleman's body is going to court to have a judge decide what to do with the man’s remains. That’s because ...

... the two feuding parties -- ex-manager Dion Mial, who also claims to be executor of Coleman’s estate, and ex-wife Price -- can’t agree on what to do with his ashes. (Just a thought: At least they concurred over the cremation. That’s something, right?)

It gets worse. Deathbed photos of Coleman were released this week under shady circumstances. First, Price denied having anything to do with the pics. Then she didn’t. And oh: Dion thinks “foul play” was involved in Coleman’s death, even though police say that at the moment they don’t suspect anything hinky.

Speaking of hinky: Price and her agent have been rummaging around in Coleman’s house looking for documents for the purposes of no-one-is-sure-what. The locks have since been changed at the behest of Dion, who insists that only he, as the executor, has the right to do said rummaging. And everybody else is just feeling so, so terrible for that poor Gary Coleman -- even though the guy wasn't stupid and, after years of friendship, had to know the nature of the associates he chose.

Somehow we suspect that, by the time we post this, there will be fresh drama on the Coleman front. Time to go fetch the waders out of storage.

-- Leslie Gornstein

Photo: Gary Coleman at a June 8, 2008, rehearsal for the TV Land Awards. Credit: David Strick / For the Los Angeles Times

Related dispatches from the Ministry of Gossip:

PREACH IT! And here we thought the Gary Coleman story was over. We’re so naive

Funeral arrangements for Gary Coleman being planned

'Diff'rent Strokes' actor Gary Coleman has died

Gary Coleman is hospitalized, reportedly in 'critical condition' after falling

Gary Coleman's show will go on in upstate New York

PREACH IT! Nothing like a dead celebrity to bring out the classy best in mankind

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Comments

[susan j. sager]

Shannon Price and her Father showed up at the $315,000 house of Gary Coleman and were seen taking out furniture and getting ready to haul off a truck. This was stopped by the police and all things put back and the locks were changed on the house.

This woman is beyond the pale, not even remotely respectful of her former husband and his personal property. She needs to be horse whipped and much hope the $10,000 she got for the photos she chokes on it.

[Cisco]

I ain't sayin' she's a golddigga'...but I told ya so...Molly Ringwald's evil twin was only in it for the money...ugly!...

[JCfromGa]

I guess it's possible brain hemorrhages spontaneously happen, however I don't believe this was spontaneous. I think it had everything to do with blunt force trauma to the head. I want to know what "officially" caused the hemorrhage that killed him, & I want to know what caused the blunt force trauma to the head. I guess it's possible to fall & cause that kind of injury, however I don't believe it was an accidental fall. I'm not even sure it was a "fall". Even though police are saying "at this moment" they don't suspect foul play, I do believe they are investigating it further. Sometimes police won't release investigative information to the public, so as not to compromise the investigation. Any law enforcement would be a complete idiot not to investigate further. They need to put that girl on a lie detector & interrogate her. They need to charge her, seizures or not, for "failure to render aid". She sounds like a sociopath on the 911 call, only she mattered. She acted waaaaay to quickly in disconnecting his life support, selling photos & interviews, moving furniture out of the house,etc.