The actor best known for playing Chekov in the new ‘Star Trek’ movies, Anton Yelchin, has died at the age of 27, his publicist says.
According to the AP, Yelchin died in a traffic crash in Los Angeles but TMZ says the cause was a freak accident…
TMZ reported: “Yelchin’s friends became alarmed because he was supposed to meet them hours earlier for a rehearsal. They went to his San Fernando Valley home at around 1 AM and found him pinned between his car and a brick mailbox, which was attached to a security gate.”
The vehicle was in neutral when police arrived and made the discovery, the report said.
Police do not suspect foul play.
Yelchin began performing in the late 1990s, appearing in several television roles and the Hollywood films Along Came a Spider and Hearts in Atlantis (both 2001). Yelchin later appeared on the television series Huff and starred in the films House of D (2005), Alpha Dog (2007), Star Trek (2009) and its sequel Star Trek Into Darkness (2013), Terminator Salvation (2009), Charlie Bartlett (2007), The Smurfs (2011) and its sequel The Smurfs 2, Fright Night (2011), Like Crazy (2011), Only Lovers Left Alive (2013) and 5 to 7 (2014).
Yelchin’s role as Jacob Clarke in the Steven Spielberg miniseries Taken was significant in furthering his career as a child actor.
