Although he is best known for bringing Jamaican music to the Western masses, Bob Marley was a trailblazer for many other reasons. With The Wailers, he channelled the warm essence of his native land into a heady potpourri of reggae, ska and rocksteady. On top of it, he established a tangible, more profound dimension with his lyrical prowess.
Producing timeless tracks such as ‘No Woman, No Cry’, ‘One Love’ and ‘Three Little Birds’ – with a little commercial help from Eric Clapton covering ‘I Shot the Sheriff’ – Marley rose quickly as one of his era’s most successful musicians. Much more than just a sonic pathfinder, his unwavering dedication to democratic social reforms at home and advocacy for marijuana legalisation and Pan-Africanism made him the people’s hero.
Tragically, however, Marley’s life and upward trajectory were cut short by melanoma on May 11th, 1981. His death came only a few years after a narrow miss when anonymous gunmen attacked his home in a suspected act of political retribution on the evening of December 3rd, 1976. The raid was only two days before the ‘Smile Jamaica’ concert, a show organised by Prime Minister Michael Manley to quell tensions between warring factions. As a result of the attack, Marley, his wife Rita and managed Don Taylor were injured. The reggae star was relatively unscathed, with minor wounds to the arm and chest, but Rita and Taylor sustained serious injuries. Rita survived a shot to the head.
In July 1977, Marley was diagnosed with a type of malignant melanoma under his right toe. By the final half of 1980, it had spread throughout his body to the brain, lungs and liver. His condition quickly worsened, and after landing in Miami, Florida, he was taken to the hospital where he would die on May 11th, 1981. His famous last words to his 12-year-old son Ziggy were: “On your way up, take me up. On your way down, don’t let me down.”
The final funeral eulogy from Jamaican Prime Minister Edward Seaga on May 21st, 1981, aptly summarised Bob Marley’s significance: “His voice was an omnipresent cry in our electronic world. His sharp features, majestic looks, and prancing style, a vivid etching on the landscape of our minds. Bob Marley was never seen. He was an experience which left an indelible imprint with each encounter. Such a man cannot be erased from the mind. He is part of the collective consciousness of the nation.”
In the years since Bob Marley’s death, the official story behind his death has been questioned by some. Due to his immense cultural significance and a longstanding and erroneous rumour surrounding how he contracted cancer, which posits the lesion was caused by a football injury, many believe that his tragic death was not due to natural causes.
Accordingly, we’re looking at the facts and theories on both sides, revealing the realities of the claims.
Investigating the death of Bob Marley:
The facts:
The dates and details: Marley died at the Cedars of Lebanon Hospital (now the Jackson Memorial Hospital), Miami, on May 11th, 1981, aged 36, from melanoma.
Cause of death: Marley was diagnosed with acral lentiginous melanoma, a type of malignant melanoma, in July 1977 under his right toe. His death was the result of it later spreading to his brain and lungs.
The official police outcome: Cancer.
The statement of his son, Ziggy Marley: “The last thing my father told me was: ‘On your way up, take me up. On your way down, don’t let me down’. A father telling his son that puts some responsibility on my shoulders. He told me that, and I take it very seriously.”
He also told the Jamaica Observer: “Yuh know how kids stay. I was kinda trying to bribe God. I told God that if him mek my father get better, I would do well at school and at home. But it never worked. My father died.”
The statement of his wife, Rita Marley: Explaining how the Marley family dealt with Bob’s death, Rita told the Evening Standard in 2012: “Our faith doesn’t allow us to believe in death, so why make provisions for when you’re gone? We never thought he was going to die. I was encouraged to ask him to write a will, but I could never have asked him to go against his beliefs.”
“Bob asked his lawyer what would happen if he didn’t make a will, and she said: ‘Your wife and children will be okay.’” She then laughed and shook her head, adding: “Which was good enough for him.”
The statement of physicians: In a piece in The Guardian titled Decolonising Dermatology, Neil Singh, a primary physician and teaching fellow at Brighton and Sussex Medical School, explained the anthropological and biological context of Marley’s melanoma.
Singh noted: “He had to see two doctors before he was offered a biopsy, which confirmed the deadliest kind of skin cancer: acral lentiginous melanoma. Unlike the other three kinds of melanoma, which usually occur on soft, sun-exposed skin, acral lentiginous melanoma occurs in easy-to-miss places, such as the soles of your feet or under your toenails.”
Continuing: “The kind of melanoma that Marley developed, and which is by far the most common subtype in dark-skinned people, was not on the radar of most doctors. In 1977, the year Marley first developed symptoms, the world’s most popular medical textbook, the Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy, published its 13th edition. It has entries on the three subtypes of melanoma that are most common in pale skin, but acral lentiginous melanoma isn’t even mentioned. Even today, it is the subtype of melanoma with the fewest successful treatment options.”
The statement of Cancer Research UK: An article in Cancer Research U.K.‘s blog maintains it would have been challenging to treat with 1980s technology.
Statements supporting the idea of a conspiracy:
Previous attempt on Marley’s life: On December 3rd, 1976, two days before the ‘Smile Jamaica’ free concert organised by Jamaican Prime Minister Michael Manley, two assuage tensions between warring political groups, Bob Marley, Rita and his manager were shot by unknown gunmen in the Marley home. While Rita and Taylor suffered serious injuries but made full recoveries, Bob received minor wounds to the chest and arm. The attack has always been thought to have been politically motivated.
He clearly had made enemies with his dedication to democratic reforms and had suffered this attempt on his life by the time he died.
The first theory: A 2019 post shared by the Instagram page Submit Conspiracy Theories prompted renewed interest in an older claim that the CIA agent “Bill Oxley” assassinated Bob Marley. Allegedly, he confessed on his deathbed.
A further claim: A separate post by the Instagram page ‘Liberty Lou’ contains details of a supposed confession from a “CIA agent”. Suggesting the reggae star was targeted for his Rastafarianism, it states that a complex rouse was set up involving this agent’s son, allowing him to get close enough to inject Marley with a cancer-causing substance.
“The day of the (Smile Jamaica Concert) event, a ‘USA photographer’ who wanted to meet Marley got access,” the post states. “He told Marley how excited he was to film the event and even brought him a pair of shoes. Bob tried on the shoe and screamed out, ‘OUCH’! They found a pointed copper/metal in the top part of the shoe. They immediately thought it was radioactive or poisoned.”
The post also claimed that doctors found Marley’s cancer five months after this event after a fellow football player stepped on his toe. “They later found out the ‘photographer’ was the CIA agent’s son,” the claim concludes.
The source of the claim: Reportedly, the source of the second claim was an archived 2017 article on the website YourNewsWire, titled CIA Agent Confesses On Deathbed: ‘I Killed Bob Marley’. This article claims that Oxley, “a 79-year-old retired officer of the CIA,” confessed to 17 assassinations between 1974 and 85 following a diagnosis that informed him he only had weeks left to live.
It continued: “As far as the agency was concerned, Bob Marley was too successful, too famous, too influential… A Jamaican Rastaman who started using his funds and fame to support causes around the world that were in direct conflict with the CIA… To be honest, he signed his own death warrant.”
It also claims that the plot to inject Marley with the cancer-causing property differs from the ‘Liberty Lou’ post, as it was Oxley who was said to have posed as the photographer, not his son.
In May 2020, the head of YourNewsWire, Sean Adl-Tabataba, told fact-checker Lead Stories: “When I closed YourNewsWire down in late 2019 and moved to NewsPunch, the focus on what we would cover editorially changed, and it was decided that we would no longer cover unreliable conspiracies whilst also being much more responsible in fact-checking content before publishing”.
Statements disproving conspiracy theory:
Statements of the media and fact-checkers: USA Today confirmed that the existence of Billy Oxley or someone with the name cannot be corroborated. Furthermore, fact-checkers Snopes and 4News found no record of him.
Status of Your News Wire: Fake news site. Describing Marley as a “Jamaican Rastaman” seriously undoes the veracity of its claims. Despite the clearly fake origins of the theory, a reprint of the story in 2018 in the Nigerian publication Vanguard was shared on Instagram by rappers Busta Rhymes and T.I.
Status of ‘Liberty Lou’: Now-defunct QAnon and Deep State-focused page, reportedly.
