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Jayne Mansfield’s Death: How Mariska Hargitay’s Mom Died in 1967

Nearly six decades after Jayne’s death, her daughter Mariska is shedding light on her mother and their family. Here, learn about the tragic car accident that ended Jayne’s life.

In the front seat of the vehicle were Jayne, her attorney and partner at the time, Sam Brody, and 19-year-old driver Ronald B. Harrison. Though Jayne’s cause of death was determined to be a “crushed skull with avulsion of cranium and brain,” rumors circulated that she was decapitated. The siblings owned up about the traumatic memory in Mariska’s 2025 documentary, My Mom Jayne, recalling that their then-3-year-old sister was nearly left at the scene of the accident.

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