The following is a list of notable deaths in December 2012.
Entries for each day are listed alphabetically by surname. A typical entry lists information in the following sequence: Name, age, country of citizenship and reason for notability, established cause of death, reference.
December 2012
1
Ahmed Taib El Alj, 84, Moroccan writer. Raymond Ausloos, 82, Belgian football player. Jovan Belcher, 25, American football player (Kansas City Chiefs), suicide by gunshot. José Bénazéraf, 90, French film director and producer. Arthur Chaskalson, 81, South African judge, Chief Justice (2001–2005), leukaemia. Mitchell Cole, 27, English footballer (Southend United, Stevenage Borough), complications of a heart defect. John Crigler, 76, American basketball player (University of Kentucky). Steve Fox, 54, English footballer, cancer. Chuck Gavin, 78, American football player. Dee Harvey, 47, American R&B singer. Rick Majerus, 64, American college basketball coach (University of Utah, Saint Louis University), heart failure. Ezroy Millwood, 70, Jamaican transport businessman. Gerard Parker, 76, American Cherokee tribal leader, Principal Chief of the Eastern Band of Cherokee Indians (1995). Rubén Pellanda, 65, Argentine politician. Ed Price, 94, American politician, member of the Florida Senate (1958–1966). Ray Rosso, 96, Italian-born American football coach, natural causes. Marcia Russell, 72, New Zealand journalist and news presenter. Edouard Saouma, 86, Lebanese civil servant, Director General of the Food and Agriculture Organization (1976–1993). Bhim Bahadur Tamang, 78, Nepali politician, stroke. Phil Taylor, 95, English footballer and coach (Liverpool). Vidal Vega, 48, Paraguayan peasant leader, shooting. Yoshinori Watanabe, 71, Japanese yakuza, fifth godfather of the Yamaguchi-gumi. Reinhold Weege, 62, American television writer and producer (Barney Miller, Night Court), natural causes. James R. Whelan, 79, American publisher (The Washington Times), multiple organ failure. Karl-Heinz Wiebe, 96, German U-boat chief engineer during World War II and Iron Cross recipient.
2
Ron Auchettl, 66, Australian footballer. Michael Crawford, 92, English cricketer. Preeti Ganguly, 59, Indian actress, cardiac arrest. Michael A. Gorman, 62, American politician, member of the North Carolina House of Representatives (2003–2005), POEMS syndrome. Tom Hendry, 83, Canadian playwright, founder of Manitoba Theatre Centre. Hiroshi Kato, 77, Japanese aikido master. Israel Keyes, 34, American alleged serial killer, suicide by hanging and lacerations. Ehsan Naraghi, 86, Iranian sociologist and writer, Director of UNESCO's Youth Division (1980–1996), long illness. Sylvester Odhiambo, Kenyan football coach (Muhoroni Youth F.C.). Décio Pignatari, 85, Brazilian poet, essayist and translator, respiratory failure. Azumir Veríssimo, 77, Brazilian footballer. Szymon, 23, Australian musician, suicide.
3
Jules Mikhael Al-Jamil, 74, Iraqi-born Lebanese Syrian Catholic hierarch, Archbishop-Procurator in Rome (since 1986). Leo Rajendram Antony, 85, Sri Lankan Roman Catholic prelate, Bishop of Trincomalee-Batticaloa (1974–1983). Amir Mahmud Anvar, 67, Iranian literary academic and poet. Tommy Berggren, 62, Swedish footballer. Ivan Boboshko, 83, Soviet football player and coach. Georgy Borisenko, 90, Soviet correspondence chess grandmaster and chess theoretician. Kuntal Chandra, 28, Bangladeshi cricketer, strangulation. Bill Donckers, 61, American football player, lymphoma. Christopher Erhardt, 53, American video game producer and academic. Peter Johnson, Sr., 91, American trial lawyer and political power broker, pulmonary fibrosis. Fyodor Khitruk, 95, Russian animator and animation director (The Story of a Crime). Mohamed Mahroof, 62, Sri Lankan politician, MP for Colombo (2000–2010). Diego Mendieta, 32, Paraguayan footballer, viral infection. Carlomagno Meneses, 85, Peruvian Olympic boxer. Eileen Moran, 60, American visual effects producer (The Lord of the Rings, Avatar, King Kong), cancer. King G. Porter, 91, American politician, member of the Tennessee State Senate. Sir Geoffrey Shakerley, 80, British photographer. Janet Shaw, 46, Australian Paralympic bronze medal-winning (2004) cyclist and author, cancer. Jeroen Willems, 50, Dutch actor and singer, cardiac arrest.