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Gypsy Rose Blanchard’s partner, Ken Urker, has died at the age of 34, a Louisiana sheriff said.
The Lafourche Sheriff’s Office said deputies responded to a residence in Raceland, Louisiana, around 6:15 p.m. Thursday. Capt. Brennan Matherne of the Lafourche Parish Sheriff’s Office told CBS News that Urker was found dead on arrival. An investigation into Urker’s death is ongoing.
Urker turned 34 on Thursday.
TMZ was the first to report the news.
In a statement to People magazine, Blanchard said Urker’s death was a surprise. Blanchard, 35, and Urker tied the knot while she was in prison for the murder of her mother, Clauddine “Dee Dee” Blanchard in 2015. They share an age of 21 months daughterAurora.
“Ken was an amazing father and a very loved man,” Gypsy Rose Blanchard told People magazine.
“I’m in disbelief,” she told the outlet. “I can’t think. I’ve screamed until my throat burned.”
Blanchard was previously engaged to Urker in 2018 and began dating him after her split from husband Ryan Anderson.
Blanchard and Anderson separation in early 2024three months after they married while she was in prison for her role in her mother’s murder. She was sentenced to 10 years for second-degree murder after the death of her mother, who was killed by Blanchard’s boyfriend at the time, Nicholas Godejohn. Blanchard, who accused her mother of subjecting her to years of child abuse released in 2023 after seven years in prison. Godejohn was sentenced to life in prison.
Police have not determined Urker’s cause of death. Blanchard told People magazine that he died of an overdose. She told the outlet that he was “not in a good state of mind recently” and that she had recently been the victim of online bullying. CBS News has reached out to Blanchard’s rep for comment.
