Anne Heche’s ‘horrific’ car crash: Eyewitness shares terrifying details from fiery incident
A witness shares with Fox News Digital details of actress Anne Heche’s car crash, calling it ‘really horrific.’
WARNING: This story contains graphic content.
Anne Heche has remained in the public eye for her often eccentric persona, but her troubled history is not without weight as she has attempted to move on from alleged sexual abuse at the hands of her father and a very public breakup with Ellen DeGeneres.
Heche, 53, who is currently "in a coma" after a being trapped in her car following a fiery crash in Los Angeles last week, suffered a mental breakdown hours after the three-year relationship with the comedian ended in 2000.
She brazenly parked her SUV on a highway in central California and walked down the road and into the desert for a mile before knocking on a stranger’s door in Cantua Creek in Fresno County.
Authorities responded to the home of the concerned resident and Heche, known for roles in "Another World" and "Juror" among other projects, was taken to a hospital after officials on scene determined there was a serious medical issue.
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Anne Heche's troubled past includes mental health issues and a very public breakup. Pictured left on "Better Together" podcast, right in '96 film "The Juror." (YouTube/Getty Images)
"She proceeded to tell me that she was God and was going to take everyone back to heaven with her in some sort of spaceship," one Fresno deputy wrote in a report at the time.
One year later, Heche admitted to Larry King that she had taken a "hit of ecstasy" when she got out of her car, adding: "I was so far gone by that point, you know, by the time I took the pill, I was waiting for my spaceship."
She told Page Six last year that the failed relationship not only blacklisted her from Hollywood, it also "canceled" her from the entertainment industry for a decade.
"I didn’t do a studio picture for 10 years," she said of the fallout. "I was fired from a $10 million picture deal and did not see the light of day in a studio picture."
Heche, the youngest of five children, was raised in a strict Baptist Christian household and told King that her father, Donald, was "in complete denial" about his "promiscuous" life. He died at the age of 45 when Heche was 13.
The same year, her brother Nathan was killed in a car collision at the age of 18.
Ellen DeGeneres and Anne Heche in 2000. The couple dated for three years. (Getty Images)
Ellen DeGeneres and Anne Heche broke up in 2000, and Heche later said she was blacklisted from the industry after their fallout. (Kurt Krieger/Corbis)
In various interviews through the years, she claimed her father was sexually abusive toward her beginning when she was a toddler.
"He raped me, he stuck his d--k in my mouth, he fondled me, he put me on all fours, and had sex with me," Heche told Barbara Walters in 2001, before adding that the abuse was only "in my memory."
"I think it's always hard for children to talk about abuse because it is only memory. I didn't carry around a tape recorder, I didn't chisel anything in stone," she said. "Anybody can look and say, 'Well how do you know for sure?' And that's one of the most painful things about it. You don't."
She said she contracted herpes from her father: "I had a rash, I had sores, I had welts on my nose and on my lips."
Heche also created "a fantasy world" that she escaped to during the abuse, a planet that was triggered during her ecstasy trip in Fresno.
Anne Heche in a scene from the film "The Juror," 1996. Alec Baldwin and Demi Moore also co-starred in the film. (Columbia Pictures)
Anne Heche attends a book signing event for her new book entitled "Call Me Crazy" at Barnes and Noble September 7, 2001, in New York City. (George De Sota)
"I called my other personality Celestia," she told Walters. "I believed I was from that world. I believed I was from another planet. I think I was insane."
Her mother, Nancy, "hung up the phone" on Heche when she confronted her about her father’s abusive past at one point, and has since denied the claims which were published in Heche’s 2001 memoir, "Call Me Crazy."
The "Six Days and Seven Nights" actress married cameraman Coleman "Coley" Laffoon in September 2001, and the couple have one son, Homer, together.
Laffoon and Heche split after five years of marriage. Their divorce was finalized on March 4, 2009.
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Heche began dating her "Men in Trees" co-star, Jame Tupper, and she confirmed she was pregnant again in December 2008. While they were never married, the couple ended their relationship in 2018 and continue to co-parent their son, Atlas.
The Emmy Award-winning actress is currently "in a coma" at a local hospital and listed in "extreme critical condition" following the car collision on Friday where her vehicle crashed into and destroyed a home in the Mar Vista area of Los Angeles.
"She has a significant pulmonary injury requiring mechanical ventilation and burns that require surgical intervention," her representative told Fox News Digital. "She is in a coma and has not regained consciousness since shortly after the accident."
Anne Heche and Coleman Laffoon at "Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle" premiere in 2003. The former couple have one son together. (Jon Kopaloff)
Heche's ex-boyfriend, Thomas Jane, had previously told the Daily Mail that the actress is "expected to pull through."
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On Monday, a public information officer for the Los Angeles Police Department confirmed to Fox News Digital that authorities obtained a warrant for a sample of Heche's blood on Aug. 5.
The results of the blood test are pending, and the investigation is ongoing. Los Angeles Police Department officials confirmed that if Heche is found to have been intoxicated during the crash, she will be charged with a DUI hit-and-run.
The owner of the house Heche crashed into was home at the time and "very narrowly escaped physical harm" after the fire began. Lynne Mishele's neighbors created a GoFundMe campaign that raised $45,000 in one day.
Lynne Bernstein, a witness of the incident, detailed the crash as "horrific" and said he could "hardly breathe" when trying to assist Heche out of the blue Mini Cooper she was driving.
"The smoke was just getting way too intense, we could hardly breathe," Bernstein said. "The smoke was making it difficult to see."
The crash "scared the entire neighborhood," Yaroslav Borets told Fox News Digital. "Something we will remember for a longtime."
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If you or someone you know is suffering from abuse, please contact the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-4673.
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