--- title: Mississippi Man Who Woke Up in Body Bag Now Dead description: Guy everyone thought was dead is now dead canonical: https://time.com/23974/walter-williams-dies-mississippi/ author: Eliana Dockterman article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-03-13T20:10:53.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-04-13T07:07:47.906Z og:title: Mississippi Man Who Woke Up in Body Bag Now Dead og:description: Guy everyone thought was dead is now dead og:url: https://time.com/23974/walter-williams-dies-mississippi/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt295bce5a63e66faa/6986836eadae44bfee541c0d/2014-02-28-12-14-04.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1500 og:image:height: 844 og:image:alt: Walter Williams in the hospital. og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Mississippi Man Who Woke Up in Body Bag Now Dead twitter:description: Guy everyone thought was dead is now dead twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt295bce5a63e66faa/6986836eadae44bfee541c0d/2014-02-28-12-14-04.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Guy Everyone Thought Was Dead Now Dead > Sponsored content. 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It curates the day's top headlines with TIME's reporting and analysis across politics, world affairs, business, health and culture. It is free to join at time.com/newsletters. #### How do I sign up for The Brief? The Brief is available free at time.com/newsletters, where readers can select it along with any of TIME's other six newsletters. There is no subscription required to receive it. #### Is The Brief free? Yes. The Brief is a free daily email newsletter from TIME. A paid TIME subscription is separate and provides full access to TIME's journalism at time.com/subscribe-agent. #### Who writes The Brief? The Brief is led by editor Richard Hall and draws on reporting from TIME's newsroom. Every edition is assembled by TIME editors rather than generated automatically.  by [Eliana Dockterman](https://time.com/author/eliana-dockterman/)  ## Eliana Dockterman Correspondent Mar 13, 2014 8:10 PM UTC  Walter Williams in the hospital in early March. Walter Williams in the hospital in early March. Courtesy of Eddie Hester  by [Eliana Dockterman](https://time.com/author/eliana-dockterman/)  ## Eliana Dockterman Correspondent Mar 13, 2014 8:10 PM UTC The 78-year-old man who [woke up in a body bag](http://bigstory.ap.org/article/2-weeks-after-waking-body-bag-miss-man-dies) at a funeral home has now died, the Associated Press reports. Walter Williams was accidentally pronounced dead two weeks ago. A Mississippi funeral home was preparing to embalm him when he began to move. He had been hospitalized in February because of congestive heart failure. A coroner pronounced Williams dead when he and several nurses could not find a pulse. Williams’ family now believes his pacemaker may have stopped working for a period of time. Williams died around 1 a.m. on Thursday. \[[_AP_](http://bigstory.ap.org/article/2-weeks-after-waking-body-bag-miss-man-dies)\] ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/23974/walter-williams-dies-mississippi/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/23974/walter-williams-dies-mississippi/"},"headline":"Guy Everyone Thought Was Dead Now Dead","datePublished":"2014-03-13T20:10:53.000Z","dateModified":"2026-04-13T07:07:47.906Z","description":"Man who woke up in a body bag dies two weeks later","url":"https://time.com/23974/walter-williams-dies-mississippi/","keywords":["Newsfeed","Bizarre"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt295bce5a63e66faa/6986836eadae44bfee541c0d/2014-02-28-12-14-04.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Eliana Dockterman","jobTitle":"Correspondent","url":"https://time.com/author/eliana-dockterman/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt295bce5a63e66faa/6986836eadae44bfee541c0d/2014-02-28-12-14-04.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"Walter Williams in the hospital.","caption":"Walter Williams in the hospital.","creditText":"Courtesy of Eddie Hester","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/23974/walter-williams-dies-mississippi/","name":"Guy Everyone Thought Was Dead Now Dead"}}]}] ```