When Kerry lost the belt back to Flair after eighteen days as champ, he ultimately ended up in the WWF/E, where he became the Intercontinental champion (secondary title only to the World championship itself) on August 27, 1990, at an even called Summerslam.[1] Nonetheless, Kerry's drug woes continued to follow him. After being suspended from the WWE for failing a drug test and missing several scheduled appearances, Kerry was busted for cocaine possession while already being on probation for having being caught forging prescriptions.[2] Days later, on February 18. 1993, he shot himself dead on his father's property. Hours after finding his son's body, Fritz Von Erich
"calmly spoke to reporters about his son and a foot amputation that no one had known about but had not prevented him from wrestling.
His right foot was amputated a year after it was severely injured in a 1986 motorcycle accident, said the father, who said everyone at the hospital and, later, the physical therapists, had sworn to secrecy.
"No one knew. It was extremely painful at first," Adkisson said. "Kerry's had a drug problem since that accident, and no one was ever about to tell why."
He said Kerry didn't want to tell because "fellas might think he was weaker."[3]
Kerry Adkisson was 33 years old. By 1993, of the six Von Erich boys, only Kevin was left behind.
Nor were these losses easy on Fritz and his wife Doris – within a year of Kerry's demise, they'd divorced, ostensibly because she blamed him for the loss of their sons.[4] Fritz, heartbroken over the myriad tragedies in his family (and often blamed for those tragedies due to having 'forced' his sons into the business in the first place, and then turning a blind eye to their psychological and substance problems) and the breakup of his marriage, died of cancer on September 10, 1997.[5]
[1] WWF, Summerslam, Colliseum Home Video, 1990.
[2] Flair, 181.
[3] Hollace Weiner, "Wrestler's suicide adds to family's woe; Tornado's death latest in series", The Montreal Gazette (20 February 1990), D5.
[4] Stu Saks, "Around the Ring", Pro Wrestling Illustrated (November 1997), 20.
[5] Schutze, A1.