DISEASE RULED OUT IN PLATO'S DEATH

MOORE, Okla. (AP) Like her young "Diff'rent Strokes" co-stars, Dana Plato
had seen her share of troubles since the show was canceled. They finally
ended not with the happiness she sought, but with the fatal drug overdose
she feared.

Ms. Plato, 34, died Saturday after apparently taking the painkiller Loritab
along with Valium while visiting the home of her fiance's parents. Dr. Fred
Jordan, the state medical examiner, said an autopsy showed no evidence of
injury or any significant natural disease. Toxicology studies are expected
to take a week.

Ms. Plato played Kimberly Drummond on the NBC sitcom that ran from 1978 to
1984. Like co-stars Todd Bridges and Gary Coleman, she couldn't sustain the
stardom the show brought her.

Legal problems began in 1991, when she was arrested for robbing a Las Vegas
video store and was placed on five years' probation. In 1992 she was given
another five years' probation for forging prescriptions for Valium.

"If I hadn't gotten caught, it could have been the worst thing that happened
to me because I could have died of a drug overdose," she said then.

Police Sgt. Scott Singer said Sunday that Ms. Plato's death "appears to be
an accidental overdose. We don't suspect suicide."

Ms. Plato and her fiance, Robert Menchaca, 28, had stopped at his parents'
home in Moore for Mother's Day. They were en route to Los Angeles from New
York, where she had appeared on Howard Stern's radio program to help revive
her career and deny the claims of a former roommate who said Ms. Plato was
on drugs.

Ms. Plato said she had been sober for about 10 years, though she had taken
painkillers when her wisdom teeth were removed four months ago.

Singer said Ms. Plato went to take a nap Saturday afternoon. Menchaca
realized that evening that something was wrong, and his mother, a nurse, and
brother tried unsuccessfully to revive her.

Ms. Plato's recent career had included mainly low-budget films such as
1992's "Bikini Beach Race" and the 1997 film "Different Strokes: A Story of
Jack and Jill ... and Jill," a direct-to-video softcore tale about a sexual
threesome.

Her "Diff'rent Strokes" co-star Bridges, who played Willis, has been
arrested several times. In 1990, he was acquitted of assault with a deadly
weapon in the near-fatal shooting of a narcotics dealer in a Los Angeles
drug den.

He once testified that he became depressed and turned to drugs after
"Diff'rent Strokes" was canceled.

Coleman, who played the lovable Arnold, pleaded no contest in February to
disturbing the peace for punching an autograph-seeker in the eye. He was
ordered to attend anger management classes, fined and given a suspended jail
sentence.

Ms. Plato has a 14-year-old son, Tyler Lambert of Tulsa, from a previous
marriage.