John Travolta’s Son Has Died
Jett Travolta has died at the age of 16.
Here’s an updated news report from the AP:
John Travolta, Kelly Preston and little Jett
NASSAU, Bahamas — John Travolta’s teenage son, Jett, died in the Bahamas after apparently suffering a seizure and hitting his head at his family’s vacation home, authorities said Friday. A house caretaker found Jett, 16, unconscious in a bathroom late Friday morning. He was taken by ambulance to a Freeport hospital, where he was pronounced dead, Police Superintendent Basil Rahming said in a statement.
The teenager had last been seen entering the bathroom on Thursday and had a history of seizures, according to the statement. An autopsy is planned.
Family attorney Michael Ossi said in a statement that Jett died suddenly on Friday. Publicists Samantha Mast and Paul Block released the statement but could not be reached for additional comment.
A local police source said Jett apparently hit his head on the bathtub.
Jett was the oldest child of Travolta, 54, and his wife, actress Kelly Preston, 46, who also have an 8-year-old daughter, Ella Bleu.
Preston has said that Jett became very sick when he was 2 years old and was diagnosed with Kawasaki disease, an illness that leads to inflammation of the blood vessels in young children. She blamed household cleaners and fertilizers, and said that a detoxification program based on teachings from the Church of Scientology helped improve his health, according to People magazine.
It is unclear whether Jett was taking any medications for his seizures. Continued below.
Jett, age 15, with mom Kelly Preston
The Scientology Celebrity Center in Los Angeles declined to comment. Both Travolta and Preston are practicing Scientologists.
A spokeswoman for Rand Memorial Hospital in Freeport said she could not release any information because of privacy concerns.
The family had arrived in the Bahamas on a private plane Tuesday and was vacationing at their home in the Old Bahama Bay resort community.
“The Travolta family has become like family to us at Old Bahama Bay and we extend our deepest sympathies to them,” said Robert Gidel, president of Ginn Resorts, the property’s owner.
Family friend and Tampa-based attorney Michael McDermott told the Ocala Star-Banner on Friday that Travolta was “broken up” and noted that “Kelly’s very quiet.”
“Just say a prayer for them,” he added. “That’s all you can do at this point.”
McDermott said that one of Travolta’s close associates was making funeral arrangements in Ocala, Florida, where Travolta has a home.
Travolta, who gained fame as Vinnie Barbarino on the 1970s television show “Welcome Back, Kotter” and the 1977 film “Saturday Night Fever,” went on to become one of Hollywood’s biggest names. He married Preston in 1991.
A television actress, Preston appeared with Travolta in the 2000 film “Battlefield Earth,” based on a novel by Scientology founder L. Ron Hubbard.
Whatever I may think about Scientology or Travolta’s involvement in it, this is tragic news for the family and I feel sorry for their loss.
Explore posts in the same categories: News
THE WOG BLOG from XENU TV 
January 2, 2009 at 4:32 pm
Very sad indeed–hard to imagine anything so terrible as losing a child. Your sentiment is focused in the right place, Mark. There may well be a Scientology-critical angle to this story (i.e., it may turn out that Scientological treatment made matters worse for Jett), but I hope that critics don’t lose sight of the human dimension here when going after those details. A child’s death is no less tragic because the parents are Scientologists, and it will make Scientology’s critics look very bad if they fail to acknowledge that fact at every turn.
January 2, 2009 at 5:13 pm
I feel bad for the Travolta family. A very tragic loss.
January 2, 2009 at 5:22 pm
very, very sad. Scientologist or critic of scientology, the pain from the loss of a child is something we all share. RIP Jett.
January 2, 2009 at 5:46 pm
How terribly sad. An experience I wouldn’t wish on anyone.
January 2, 2009 at 7:44 pm
He’s with Xenu now. Hey Barbarino! You’re kid would be alive right now if you didn’t join a retarded CULT! I laugh at you now HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!
January 2, 2009 at 7:55 pm
As a father of children it is my earnest wish to die before them. I would forego riches and fame to enable the natural order of life to comply with my expectations. My brother tragically lost his young daughter in a road accident when she was only 19. This was 10 years ago. Our mother died last September and the difference in the two deaths was that our mother managed to get to the ripe old age of 84 and we were prepared for it. Family came from all over the world to celebrate her life, and celebrate we did. At the funeral of my niece we were all, in comparison ,subdued. How do you celebrate a life which has been cut short?
And now for the hard bit. As a human being I can sympathise readily with Travolta’s loss. This loss is a devastating event which should be respected. However, my respect for the person of Travolta himself remains at zero. I do not agree with the scientology philosophy, as aptly depicted by Miscaviges’ attitude, which abruptly forbids the mourning process -demeaning it’s value and calling it an unnecessary obstruction to the more important project of raising the stats.
Travolta, entrapped as he is, has the awful conflict of wanting to express his genuine sorrow in a human vein yet at the same time be forced to exhibit the nature of a pure scientologist: which is to see the death of his son as nothing special. A thetan is immortal, his son will find another body, so sadness is a selfishness -which impedes scientology progress. And then it becomes a crime.
As a celebrity he will be indulged, but the firm will short-change him. Miscavige will undoubtably use the death of Travoltas son to raise sympathy for Travolta and indirectly for PR reasons to the cult itself. It may be subtle, it may be blunt. It is not cynical to imagine Miscavige exercising his own cynicism when chances arise.
As I understand Travoltas pain I still wish this present circumstance helps him to wake up. I can never put aside the knowledge I have gained about the ambitions of his vicious organisation which has caused the death of many -and have ready plans for the distruction of MY own children should they behave like me in conspiring in it’s demise. . My children belong traditionally to a family which has consistantly fought against tyranny: against Franco, Hitler and Hubbard. One day they will ask themselves: “What will they do to us if we disagree with them?” and they will understand that life can never always consist of a peaceful exchange of words when corrupt ambitions abound. Travolta is afterall a part of a culture which plans to destroy them.
BT writes: “A childs death is no less tragic because the parents are scientologists and it will make scientology’s critics look very bad if they fail to acknowledge that fact at every turn.”
It must be said that critics will look bad to other NON-scientologists who neglect to inform themselves about the scientology attitude towards human death , as well as to their evil ambitions in general. Scientologists themselves are strait-jacketed into the cult’s system of beliefs, and wouldn’t really CARE about young Travolta’s death ( or do you want a disagreement with DM about it?) but they are trained to find a way of using it. We in contrast are moved by our conscience to refrain from excepting a possible advantage: which is namely an autopsy which shows up something disreputable to scientology.
I will be surprised if there isn’t, because even the death of Ken Moxon’s daughter was covered up. I want my children to live in a world free from totalitarian ambitions. I want the covert infiltration of our institutions to be stopped. I want the corruption of our systems to be exposed and prevented. I want democracy to survive. I do not want ‘1984’ to curtail our emotional, political and intellectual freedom. I do not want us to be afraid of demanding the truth. Therefore it should be expected that the autopsy is conducted correctly by a non-scientologist and the results released to the public. Otherwise we shall have to consider it as yet another suspicious death, and if that is the case we must be prepared to use it.
January 4, 2009 at 10:49 am
John is easily one of the nicest human beings I ever met while I was in Scientology.
I met him on the Freewinds in the early nineties at an International Artist Convention.
He called me to the stage to talk about my Art which was inspired by his movie “Look Who’s Talking”. (He owns one of my watercolors.)
John has a fabulous sence of humor and the conversation we had, kept the audience enthralled and laughing through the thunderous applause and standing ovation!
I have since left Scientology and consider myself lucky because I nearly lost my daughter trying to follow the MEDICAL advice of Scientology.
You can read my article “Comment by a Friend of Elli Perkins” posted on the Jeremy Perkins website.
We do not know the details of Jett’s death. One thing I am certain of is the entire family will be sent to ETHICS to discover the SP, the suppressive person, in their lives who caused this tragedy.
Maybe, JOHN will again express dissatisfaction or doubt about Scientology as he did so many years ago on the FREEWINDS which was one of the reasons he and Michael Pattinson. an OT VIII, happened to be at the artist convention that year.
Little does John Travolta know that the SP is L. Ron Hubbard himself but he will never find out the truth until he leaves Scientology or stops denying himself the truth.
John is such a kind man and does not deserve to suffer such a great loss.
My prayers are with him and his entire family.
Godspeed, John. I hope some day we will be able to talk again.
January 4, 2009 at 10:21 pm
Although everyone is entitled to their own opinions i STRONGLY disagree with some of what General Public had to say above. Firstly it struck me, as an ex SO member to hear that Scientologists as a hole care not about death the way others do.It’s simply not true. The same way christians believe in heaven as a way of making the death seem more easily acceptable Scientologists believe that they will go on to another life, but i have never seen in the many funerals I have been to or organized as Chaplain of a Sea Org, a death being invalidated or its relevance being insinuated to be of small importance. Never have I also witnessed people using it to make a stat out of it.
That David Miscavige or SOME may, is not in question, I wholly agree, but to generalize and imply ALL staff members and ALL Scientologist feel this way is simply a lie borne out of lack of knowledge. I witnessed tears, grief, anguish, a whole array of emotions for death, both for elderly SO members and Scientologist and for young ones whose lives were cut short unexpectedly.
Please do not generilize. I disagree with Scn and the Sea Org. Im an ex of BOTH, but i KNOW there are plenty, if not most members of both groups who are simply lost in their own confusions, in the matrix, part of a Truman Show without even realizing. Good people with good hearts who HONESTLY, like I did, think they are doing the best for those around him. all with a general good will to help.
To put them all in the same category as David Miscavige is an index of no compassion and a lack of true understanding of the cult and trap that is Scientologist.
Scientology and DM’s victims, first and foremost, are its Sea Org, staff and public, then the public at large in danger of becoming its prey.
Jett RIP and John, having met you, i offer u my condolensces for your loss and I hope one day we view Scientology from the same viewpoint and maybe it wont be SPs we read abt in the history books, but Scientology….
January 4, 2009 at 11:42 pm
Ex, well said.
January 5, 2009 at 2:16 am
I’ll take back the generalisation because in haste is was clumsily written, and replace it with a question: if grief undermines the stability of the ‘stats’ what is managements attitude towards it and what happens when the needs of management and the bereaved conflict?
It is not that scientologists have no feelings, it is rather that they are second in rank to the needs of the cult. Correct medical attention is also lower in importance than following the ‘party line’. This is now the most important issue. Although Travolta loved his son -the question of whether he contributed to his death by denying the appropriateness of the use of certain drugs hangs like a cloud above him.
Unnecessary and untimely deaths in scientology have happened before. How strong are you in demanding the examination of this particular one? In a pattern already developing, stress in being put on expressing sympathy for a father AT THE EXPENSE
of the child. My suspicions, which I expect to be confirmed, lead me to believe that by putting scientology before adequate medication John Travolta BETRAYED his son.
January 5, 2009 at 2:35 am
What was the name of the highly ranked scieno who asked for permission to go to his father’s death bed/ funeral? Miscavige wouldn’t give it and the guy didn’nt go. Doesn’t that mean ‘Ex Sea Org’ you can only grieve when it’s allowed?
“Scientology and DM’s victims, first and foremost, are its Sea Org, staff and public, then the public at large in danger of becoming its prey.”
This is not true. First, those subject to Fair Game are the first and foremost victims of DM and his cult. WITHIN the cult the first victims are THE CHILDREN -those who are unable to defend themselves by reason of their size and development.
January 5, 2009 at 3:26 am
Newspaper report:
“Travolta’s lawyers, Michael Ossi and Michael McDermott, told the celebrity website TMZ that Jett had been on anti-seizure medication for several years.
They said the prescription was suspended after the drug lost its effectiveness amid concerns about side-effects, adding that Jett had been suffering about one extremely serious seizure a week.
……that he may have had epilepsy, and experienced grand-mal convulsions and losses of consciousness .”
.”….the drug LOST ITS EFFECTIVENESS.” !!!!!!!
TORY, are you there? You are the only person I know of who has had the so named ‘grand mal’ seizures as Jett T and say that since you resumed your medication you havn’t had one since. Are Travolta’s lawyers making creditable statements, or is it damage limitation?
January 5, 2009 at 4:01 am
From the EPILECTIC FOUNDATION:
Antiepileptic drugs successfully prevent seizures in the majority of people who take them regularly and as prescribed. It has been estimated that at least fifty percent of all patients with epilepsy gain complete control of their seizures for substantial periods of time. Another thirty percent enjoy a significant reduction in the number of seizures. If patients, in collaboration with their physicians, decide to attempt withdrawal from medications, they should be aware that the seizures may recur and should closely observe seizure precautions. ”
If Jett was suffering “one extremely serious seizure a week” why was he left unattended? (Did he also have minor seizures too?) His predicament was not discovered until several hours later, by then it was too late.
Only with the openness of Jett’s parents and their scientology doctors and advisors will we know if Jett was one of the unfortunate 20% who didn’t respond to the usual treatments. Their openess will also help questions arising from today’s autopsy report.