Autopsy on Herbalife’s Hughes Finds No Trauma

An autopsy conducted Tuesday on the body of Mark Reynolds Hughes, the wealthy 44-year-old founder of Herbalife International Inc., indicated “no criminal intent on anyone’s part,” a coroner’s official said.

“We can say there was no evidence of external signs of trauma,” said Scott Carrier.

Additional toxicology and tissue sample tests are pending, and it could take four to six weeks for the results, Carrier said.

“These types of tests are routine,” Carrier said.

Hughes, enmeshed recently in a struggle for ownership of his weight-loss and nutritional products company, was found dead by his wife Sunday morning in his Malibu mansion.

Hughes founded Herbalife in 1980, and the company reached $500 million in annual sales five years later. Revenues were generated both by outside sales and through the company’s network of 750,000 independent distributors.

In 1986, Hughes took the company public. Later, after he announced that the company was having difficulty arranging funding, the price of its stock shares dropped sharply.