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Notable deaths this week: Ex-WWE star, former Sox pitcher

• "Rowdy" Roddy Piper, the kilt wearing trash-talker who headlined the first WrestleMania and later found movie stardom, has died at age 61.

Piper, born Roderick Toombs in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, is the second WWE Hall of Famer to die this summer, following the June death of "The American Dream" Dusty Rhodes. Piper's death also comes days after Hulk Hogan, his biggest rival for decades, was fired by the WWE. Hogan had used racial slurs in a conversation captured on a sex tape.

Piper and Hogan battled for years and headlined some of the biggest matches during the 1980s. Hogan and Mr. T beat Piper and Paul Orndorff on March 31, 1985, at the first WrestleMania at Madison Square Garden in a bout that featured Muhammad Ali as the guest referee.

More recently, Piper appeared in the show "Celebrity Wife Swap," trading wives with fellow former wrestler Ric Flair.

Lynn Anderson

Lynn Anderson, whose strong, husky voice carried her to the top of the charts with "(I Never Promised You a) Rose Garden," has died. She was 67.

Her publicist said the cause of death was cardiac arrest.

Anderson first soaked up the national spotlight as a young singer on "The Lawrence Welk Show" between 1967 and 1969. Although she was signed to an independent label, the exposure helped her nab a deal with Columbia Records in Nashville.

And it was "Rose Garden" that sealed her country music legacy, earning her a Grammy and Country Music Association's female vocalist of the year award in 1971.

She made television appearances with such stars as Lucille Ball, Bing Crosby, John Wayne and Tom Jones and she performed for presidents Nixon, Ford, Carter and Reagan. She was also in episodes of the TV show "Starsky and Hutch" and in the 1982 TV movie "Country Gold."

Anderson's other hits included, "Rocky Top," "You're My Man," "How Can I Unlove You," "What a Man, My Man Is" and "Top of the World" (also recorded by the Carpenters).

She returned briefly to the country Top 10 with a Gary Morris duet in 1983, "You're Welcome to Tonight."

• Jerry Dutton, a prominent thoroughbred trainer in California for more than 50 years, died Thursday in his native Idaho. He was 87.

Billy Pierce

Billy Pierce, a seven-time All-Star pitcher who played in two World Series and spent most of his 18 years in the majors with the Chicago White Sox, has died at 88.

Pierce died after a battle with gall bladder cancer, said his family and the White Sox.

The left-hander played for Chicago from 1949 to 1961, starting three All-Star games in the mid-1950s. He also played for his hometown Detroit Tigers and the San Francisco Giants, going 211-169 with a 3.27 ERA, 1,999 strikeouts, 193 complete games and 38 shutouts. He reached the series with Chicago in 1959 and pitched a three-hit victory for San Francisco in Game 6 three years later against the Yankees.

His No. 19 was retired by the White Sox in 1987, and he made it onto the Hall of Fame's Golden Era Committee ballot last year though he was not voted in.

"Generations of White Sox fans lost one of their heroes today," White Sox Chairman Jerry Reinsdorf said in a statement.

• Former Detroit Wing Rings defenseman Leo Reise Jr. has died. He was 93.

Reise had 21 goals and 61 assists in 340 games for Detroit from 1946-52. He was a four-time All-Star with the Red Wings and played on Detroit's 1950 and 1952 Stanley Cup champion teams.

The Stoney Creek, Ontario, native also played for Chicago and New York in his nine-season NHL career that ended in 1953.

• Mullah Muhammad Omar, the reclusive cleric who founded Afghanistan's Taliban guerrilla movement and sheltered al-Qaeda leaders as they plotted the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the U.S., has died. He was about 54.

He died in Pakistan in April 2013, the Afghan government confirmed Wednesday in a statement.

• Dr. James Jude, one of the experts credited with pioneering life-saving cardiopulmonary resuscitation, has died. He was 87.

In the late 1950s, the doctor and two electrical engineers, William Kouwenhoven and Guy Knickerbocker, did research which led to their development of chest compression in 1960. This was later combined with work by others on artificial respiration to become CPR.

Ann Rule

True-crime writer Ann Rule signed a contract to write a book about an unknown Seattle serial killer six months before he was identified as her co-worker Ted Bundy, who shared the night shift at Seattle's Crisis Clinic.

The woman credited by her publisher with reinventing the previously male-dominated true crime genre by focusing on the victims has died at age 83.

Rule wrote more than 30 books, including "The Stranger Beside Me," which profiled Bundy.

Singer Whitney Houston, left, and daughter Bobbi Kristina Brown arrive at an event in Beverly Hills, Calif. Brown, who was in hospice after months of receiving medical care, died last Sunday. Associated Press/Feb. 12, 2011

R&B singer Bobby Brown said Monday that his daughter, Bobbi Kristina Brown, was "an angel" and that the family must find a way to honor her memory.

Bobbi Kristina, the daughter of singer Whitney Houston, died Sunday in hospice care, six months after she was found face-down in a bathtub in her suburban Atlanta townhome. Authorities are investigating her death.

"Krissy was and is an angel," her father said in a statement. "I am completely numb at this time. My family must find a way to live with her in spirit and honor her memory. Our loss is unimaginable."

Born and raised in the shadow of fame and litigation, shattered by the loss of her mother, Bobbi Kristina was overwhelmed by the achievements and demons of others before she could begin to figure out who she was.

Bobbi Kristina - the sole heir of her mother's estate - did have dreams.

She identified herself on Twitter as "Daughter of Queen WH," "Entertainer/Actress" with William Morris & Co., and "LAST of a dying breed." She told Oprah Winfrey shortly after her mother's death in 2012 that she wanted to carry on her mother's legacy by singing, acting and dancing. But her career never took off.

• James L. White, who wrote the screenplay for "Ray," the 2004 movie about singer Ray Charles, has died in California. He was 67.

"Ray" received a best-picture Oscar nomination. It was White's only feature credit, although he worked on unproduced screenplays.

• Russian news agencies say film director Vasily Pichul, whose gritty perestroika-era movie "Little Vera" attracted international attention, has died at age 54.

The 1988 movie caused a sensation at home for sex scenes that were unusually revealing for generally prudish Soviet cinema. It was also straightforwardly critical of Soviet society and provincial mores. Vera is both the lead character's name and the Russian word for faith.

The movie won Pichul awards at the Venice and Montreal film festivals. He went on to direct other films as well as television programs.

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