List of Famous people who died in 2008

Heath Andrew Ledger was an Australian actor, photographer, and music video director. After playing roles in several Australian television and film productions during the 1990s, Ledger moved to the United States in 1998 to further develop his film career. His work consisted of twenty films, including 10 Things I Hate About You (1999), The Patriot (2000), A Knight's Tale (2001), Monster's Ball (2001), Lords of Dogtown (2005), Brokeback Mountain (2005), Candy (2006), The Dark Knight (2008), and The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus (2009), the latter two being posthumous releases. He also produced and directed music videos and aspired to be a film director.

Robert James Fischer was an American chess grandmaster and the eleventh World Chess Champion.

Paul Leonard Newman was an American actor, film director, race car driver, and entrepreneur. He was the recipient of numerous awards, including an Academy Award, a BAFTA Award, three Golden Globe Awards, a Screen Actors Guild Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, the Cecil B. DeMille Award, and the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award.

George Denis Patrick Carlin was an American stand-up comedian, actor, social critic and author. Regarded as one of the most important and influential stand-up comics of all time, he was dubbed "the dean of counterculture comedians". He was known for his dark comedy and reflections on politics, the English language, psychology, religion, and taboo subjects. His "seven dirty words" routine was central to the 1978 United States Supreme Court case F.C.C. v. Pacifica Foundation, in which a 5–4 decision affirmed the government's power to censor indecent material on the public airwaves.

Field Marshal Sam Hormusji Framji Jamshedji Manekshaw,, widely known as Sam Manekshaw and Sam Bahadur, was the Chief of the Army Staff of the Indian Army during the Indo-Pakistani War of 1971, and the first Indian Army officer to be promoted to the rank of field marshal. His military career spanned four decades and five wars, beginning with service in the British Indian Army in World War II.

Bruce Edwards Ivins was an American microbiologist, vaccinologist, senior biodefense researcher at the United States Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), Fort Detrick, Maryland, and the suspected perpetrator of the 2001 anthrax attacks. Ivins died on July 29, 2008, of an overdose of acetaminophen (Tylenol) in an apparent suicide after learning that criminal charges were likely to be filed against him by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) for an alleged criminal connection to the attacks.

Léo Major was a French-Canadian soldier who was the only Canadian and one of only three soldiers in the British Commonwealth to receive the Distinguished Conduct Medal (DCM) twice in separate wars. Major earned his first DCM in World War II in 1945 after a successful reconnaissance mission in Zwolle. As he was sent to scout the city with one of his best friends, a firefight broke out in which his friend was killed, yet he still continued, after which he found that the city was mostly deserted by the German occupational army. Thanks to his efforts Zwolle was spared from the artillery fire that was planned the next day by the Allies. He received his second DCM during the Korean War for leading the capture of a key hill in 1951.

Yves Henri Donat Mathieu-Saint-Laurent, professionally known as Yves Saint-Laurent, was a French fashion designer who, in 1961, founded his eponymous fashion label. He is regarded as being among the foremost fashion designers in the twentieth century. In 1985, Caroline Rennolds Milbank wrote, "The most consistently celebrated and influential designer of the past twenty-five years, Yves Saint Laurent can be credited with both spurring the couture's rise from its 1960s ashes and with finally rendering ready-to-wear reputable." He was able to adapt his style to accommodate the changes in fashion during that period. He approached fashion in a different perspective by wanting women to look comfortable yet elegant at the same time. He is also credited with having introduced the tuxedo suit for women and was known for his use of non-European cultural references, and non-white models.

Igor Fedorovich "Yegor" Letov was a Russian poet, musician, singer-songwriter, audio engineer and conceptual art painter, best known as the founder and leader of the post-punk/psychedelic rock band Grazhdanskaya Oborona. He was also the founder of the conceptual art avant-garde project Kommunizm and psychedelic rock outfit Egor i Opizdenevshie. Letov collaborated with singer-songwriter Yanka Dyagileva and other Siberian underground artists as a record engineer and producer.

Rudolph Frank Moore, known as Rudy Ray Moore, was an American comedian, singer, actor, and film producer. He created the character Dolemite, the pimp from the 1975 film Dolemite and its sequels, The Human Tornado and The Return of Dolemite. The persona was developed during his early comedy records. The recordings often featured Moore delivering profanity-filled rhyming poetry, which later earned Moore the nickname "the Godfather of Rap". Actor and comedian Eddie Murphy portrayed Moore in the 2019 film Dolemite Is My Name.

Muslim Magometovich Magomayev, dubbed the "King of Songs" and the "Soviet Sinatra" was a Soviet, Azerbaijani and Russian opera and pop singer. He achieved iconic status in Russia and the post-Soviet countries for his vocal talent and charisma. People's Artist of the USSR (1973).

John Emil List was an American mass murderer and long-time fugitive. On November 9, 1971, he killed his wife, mother, and three children at their home in Westfield, New Jersey, and then disappeared; he had planned the murders so meticulously that nearly a month passed before anyone suspected that anything was amiss.

Rutilio Torres Mantecón, also known as Rui Torres was an artist known for being the presenter for the first and second seasons of the Latin American version of the TV show Art Attack of the TV channel Disney Channel.

Charlton Heston was an American actor and political activist. As a Hollywood star, he appeared in almost 100 films over the course of 60 years. He played Moses in the epic film The Ten Commandments (1956), for which he received his first nomination for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama. He also starred in The Greatest Show on Earth (1952), Secret of the Incas (1954), Touch of Evil (1958) with Orson Welles, The Big Country (1958), Ben-Hur (1959), for which he won the Oscar for Best Actor, El Cid (1961), The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965), Planet of the Apes (1968), The Omega Man (1971) and Soylent Green (1973).

Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn was a Russian novelist, philosopher, historian, short story writer and political prisoner. Solzhenitsyn was an outspoken critic of the Soviet Union and Communism and helped to raise global awareness of the Soviet Gulag forced-labor camp system.

Tukaram Omble AC was a Mumbai police officer and army soldier, who served as assistant sub-inspector (ASI) of the Mumbai Police. He was martyred in action while fighting terrorists during the 2008 Mumbai attacks, at Girgaum Chowpatty Mumbai, and was instrumental in apprehending Ajmal Kasab alive. The lone surviving terrorist Kasab was later convicted and hanged. The Indian government posthumously honoured Omble, on 26 January 2009, with the Ashoka Chakra – the country's highest peace-time gallantry award for extraordinary bravery and valour in the line of duty.

Adelir Antônio de Carli, also known in Brazil as Padre Baloeiro or Padre do Balão, was a Brazilian Catholic priest, who died during an attempt at cluster ballooning on April 20, 2008. Carli, an experienced skydiver, undertook the exercise in order to raise money to fund a spiritual rest area for truck drivers in the Paraná port city of Paranaguá.

Roy Richard Scheider was an American actor and amateur boxer. He played Martin Brody in the thriller film Jaws (1975), reprising the role in its sequel Jaws 2 (1978).

Şehzade Burhaneddin Cem was the heir apparent to the headship of the Ottoman dynasty. He was born at Beşiktaş, Istanbul as the son of Prince Ibrahim Tevfik (1874–1931) and his fourth wife Hatice Sadiye Hanım (1898–1986). Burhaneddin was a descendant of Sultan Abdülmecid I. He married Irene Starosselskaya of Russian–Georgian noble descent and had two children, Nilüfer Sultan and Şehzade Selim (1955).

Marpessa Dawn, also known as Gypsy Marpessa Dawn Menor, was an American born French actress, as well as a singer and dancer. She is best remembered for her role in the film Black Orpheus (1959).