Daveigh Chase, child star of 'Lilo & Stitch' and 'The Ring,' dead at 35 after meningitis and sepsis

Daveigh Chase, the actress who gave voice to Lilo Pelekai in Disney's Lilo & Stitch and terrified audiences as Samara Morgan in The Ring, has died at age 35. Her boyfriend, Roy Hernandez, told TMZ that Chase died after contracting meningitis and several serious blood infections that led to sepsis, as first detailed by Hello! Magazine.

Chase died on Tuesday, June 17, 2026, in Los Angeles, according to the Washington Times, which reported she had been admitted to a Los Angeles hospital earlier in June for malnutrition. The septic complications that followed led to organ shutdown.

Born July 24, 1990, in Las Vegas and raised in Albany, Oregon, Chase landed the lead voice role in Lilo & Stitch at just eight years old. By 2002, she had already played one of modern horror's most recognizable figures, the ghostly girl who crawls from a television set. She won the 2003 MTV Movie Award for Best Villain, beating out Mike Myers, Colin Farrell, Willem Dafoe, and Daniel Day-Lewis. That same year, she took home an Annie Award for her voice work in Lilo & Stitch.

She also voiced Chihiro Ogino in the American dubbed version of Hayao Miyazaki's Spirited Away, and starred alongside the late Bill Paxton in HBO's Big Love. Guest appearances on ER, Charmed, Touched by an Angel, Family Law, and The Practice filled out a résumé that few child actors could match.

Then, in 2017, at age 27, Daveigh Chase walked away from Hollywood.

A life after the spotlight

What followed her departure from the industry was, by all available accounts, a steep and painful decline. Hernandez, who started a GoFundMe page while Chase was still receiving treatment, described a woman who had endured bullying, a falling out with her family, and years of struggling "to find safety and happiness."

On the fundraising page, Hernandez wrote of his girlfriend's final days:

"Her condition has become critical, and the doctors have told me she may not have much time left. All she ever wanted was a place where we could live together, feel safe, and be happy. Now, more than ever, I want to give her that sense of home and peace in her final days."

He also reflected on their relationship: "When we met, I promised to protect her and give her the love and comfort she deserved. Together, we found moments of happiness and hope."

Those words paint a picture of someone far removed from the child star who once charmed millions. The entertainment world has lost a number of well-known figures in recent weeks, including veteran actor Anthony Stewart Head, a reminder of how fragile even celebrated lives can be.

Millions in unclaimed residuals

The circumstances surrounding Chase's final years grew even more troubling with reporting from the New York Post, which revealed that Chase had millions of dollars in unclaimed SAG-AFTRA residuals sitting in an account at the time of her death. The money stemmed from her role as Lilo in Disney's franchise, a deal that included merchandise, theme park attractions, and other products.

Her former manager, John Ryan, told the Post that Chase was "too far gone" in heroin and fentanyl addiction to collect the money. Ryan described years of failed attempts to reach her, including efforts to locate her on Skid Row after a disturbing video surfaced in late 2025 showing Chase severely emaciated and barely conscious in a trailer.

Ryan also cast doubt on the GoFundMe effort, stating: "Apparently, a man claiming to be her boyfriend that none of us friends or her family has heard of has set up a GoFundMe on her and her families behalf... I can confirm Daveigh has a trust account set up at SAG to cover all costs."

That claim raises hard questions. If Chase had a SAG trust account sufficient to cover her medical and living expenses, why was a crowdfunding campaign necessary? And who, exactly, was looking out for her interests in those final months?

The medical reality

Dr. Ravi Lukha, Medical Director of Bupa UK Insurance, provided medical context to Hello! Magazine about the disease that took Chase's life. He explained that meningitis is "the infection of the lining around the brain and spinal cord and can be caused by both bacteria and viruses."

He added that the illness "usually requires close or prolonged contact between people for transmission," and that "most people won't realize they're carrying [the virus], but sometimes they can lead to a serious infection." The specific type of meningitis Chase contracted, bacterial or viral, has not been disclosed.

What is clear is that Chase was hospitalized for malnutrition before the infections took hold. For someone already in a weakened physical state, the progression from infection to sepsis to organ failure can be swift and devastating.

Sudden, premature deaths continue to shake public attention. Jake Hall, the former reality television star, also died at 35 just recently, a grim coincidence in age that underscores how many lives end far too soon.

A career that deserved a different ending

Chase's talent was never in question. In a 2009 interview with Interview Magazine, she said: "I just want to make something that I love and people will respect. I want to do things that will change someone's life, not something they'll forget about tomorrow."

She succeeded on that count. Fans flooded social media with tributes after news of her death broke. One commenter called her "one of the most iconic modern horror characters." Another wrote, "Spirited away was my childhood movie im so sad." A third referenced her Disney legacy: "D***, we lost a sister.. 'Ohana' means family..."

The outpouring was genuine. But it also arrived years too late for a woman who, by multiple accounts, had been living in extreme hardship while a fortune sat unclaimed in a union trust.

The broader pattern here is one Americans have seen before. A child enters an industry that chews through young people with alarming regularity. She works for two decades, earns accolades, and then disappears into circumstances that would alarm anyone paying attention. Unexpected deaths remind us that public visibility offers no shield against private catastrophe.

Questions that remain

Several facts remain unresolved. The GoFundMe page lists its author variously as "Roy" and "Rory" Hernandez, whether this reflects a typo or a discrepancy is unclear. The total amount raised and the fundraiser's ultimate disposition have not been publicly detailed. The nature of Chase's estrangement from her family, referenced by Hernandez, remains unexplained.

And the central, uncomfortable question lingers: How does a woman with millions in residuals and a SAG trust account end up hospitalized for malnutrition, dying of sepsis at 35, with a GoFundMe as her public lifeline?

Hollywood has no shortage of tributes for its fallen. What it lacks, and what Daveigh Chase apparently needed, is a system that catches people before they fall past the point of rescue.