Linkin Park’s Mike Shinoda corrects false reports Chester Bennington had MDMA in his system when he died

Media outlets misread the toxicology report

Author: Scott ColothanPublished 6th Dec 2017
Last updated 6th Dec 2017

Linkin Park’s Mike Shinoda has corrected false media reports that Chester Bennington had MDMA (ecstasy) in his system when he died in July.

Celebrity gossip site TMZ last night published details of Chester’s autopsy toxicology report, which they initially claimed showed he had alcohol and MDMA in his system based on an antibody-based test called ELISA.

However, a mass-spectrometer test, which is used to detect and identify chemical structures, failed to detect MDMA from a urine sample; where drugs remain for longer periods of time.

Therefore, the conclusion was he didn’t have the drug in his system at the time of his death. Chester also only had minimal traces of alcohol in his system.

TMZ later corrected their article, however, at the time of writing, there are many websites still reporting that Chester had MDMA in his system.

Highlighting this, Mike Shinoda wrote: “Just clearing this up: TMZ erroneously printed CB had MDMA in his system when he passed. That was incorrect, they misread the report. They have since corrected their piece, see below. I hope other publications have the decency to do the same.”

Chester took his own life on 20th July at his private residence in Palos Verdes Estates in Los Angeles.

Following an almost unprecedented outpouring of grief and tributes from fans, in October the remaining members of Linkin Park played their first show since Chester’s death in his memory at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles.

The ‘Linkin Park and Friends – Celebrate Life in Honor of Chester Bennington’ concert saw them join forces with Blink-182, Jonathan David of Korn, Avenged Sevenfold’s M. Shadows and Synyster Gats, Daron Malakian and Shavo Odadjian of System of a Down, Bring Me The Horizon’s Oli Sykes and many more.