‘The Wire’ Actor Bobby J. Brown’s Cause of Death Revealed

The Wire actor Bobby J. Brown died on February 24 after being caught in a barn fire at his home in Maryland, and now his official cause of death has been confirmed. He was 62.

According to People, the Maryland Office of the Chief Medical Examiner ruled Brown’s cause of death as diffuse thermal injury and smoke inhalation. The manner of death was determined to be an accident.

As previously reported, Brown died after a fire broke out in the 50-by-100-foot barn after he tried to start up his old Cadillac. His wife, Arlene Brown, suffered severe burns as she attempted to rescue him from the barn while emergency services made their way to the scene.

Brown’s daughter, Reina, previously spoke to People about receiving a call about her father’s death late at night. “I was sound asleep. I had gone to bed about two hours before,” she shared. “My little sister [was] freaking out, saying that Dad’s gone and that he got caught up in a barn fire, and I’m like, ‘What do you mean?'”

Reina said she struggled to make sense of the news and had to go outside and put her bare feet on the ground to “make sure I was really awake” and “not dreaming this up.”

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“I couldn’t believe it,” she added. “I was like, this isn’t real. And I still don’t even feel like it’s real. Everybody is still trying to process it. It’s been difficult for all of us.”

Reina described her dad as “an amazing human being,” saying, “He was super awesome. He was a pillar in the community, and he’s going to be missed by a lot of people.”

While best known for his portrayal of Baltimore cop Bobby Brown on HBO’s The Wire, Brown also appeared in We Own This City as Sergeant Thomas Allers, Homicide: Life on the Street, and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, as well as films such as 2002’s City by the Sea, 2016’s My One and Only, and 2018’s Fishbowl.