In passing
Frank Sanache, 86, Meskwaki code talker
Tama, Iowa Frank Sanache, the last of the “code talkers” from the Meskwaki Indian tribe, died Saturday. He was 86.
Sanache was among the “elite eight,” a group of Meskwakis trained to use their language as a secret code during World War II.
The Meskwaki were among 18 tribes that contributed code talkers during the war. Their achievements went largely unnoticed because the code was classified until 1968.
Twenty-nine original Navajo code talkers were presented with the Congressional Gold Medal by President Bush in 2001.
The Meskwakis never received that recognition, although Sens. Charles Grassley and Tom Harkin of Iowa pushed for it. Harkin awarded Sanache, the last surviving member, medals in 2002.
Noble Watts, 78, blues, jazz saxphonist
Deland, Fla. Blues and jazz saxophonist Noble “Thin Man” Watts, who led the house band at Sugar Ray Robinson’s club in Harlem and played on rock ‘n’ roll tours with Fats Domino and Jerry Lee Lewis, died Tuesday. He was 78.
Watts had been in a nursing home for months struggling with emphysema and pneumonia.
He released a series of singles on Baton Records, including the instrumental hits “Hard Times (the Slop)” in 1957 and “Jookin”’ in 1961.
Watts established his reputation in New York in the 1950s, where he played with the house band at Robinson’s club in Harlem. He also played with Lionel Hampton’s orchestra and on rock ‘n’ roll tours.
Saxophonists from King Curtis to Bruce Springsteen sideman Clarence Clemons were influenced by his booming tenor sound.
Watts attended Florida A&M University where he played in the marching band with future jazz legends Cannonball and Nat Adderley.
The African American Museum of the Arts in DeLand dedicated an amphitheater named after Watts in May. And Stetson University, where he raked leaves as a boy to pay for music lessons, gave him an honorary doctorate in 2000.
Dennis Miles, 45, Body Count guitarist
Los Angeles Dennis “D-Roc” Miles, rhythm guitarist for Ice-T’s band Body Count, died Tuesday. He was 45.
Miles died from complications from lymphoma at the City of Hope Hospital in Duarte, according to a statement on Ice-T’s Web site.
“D-Roc was the backbone of the Body Count sound,” said Ice-T, who now plays Detective Odafin “Fin” Tutuola on NBC’s “Law & Order: Special Victims Unit.”
Body Count debuted in 1991 with the controversial song “Cop Killer.”
Miles was known for wearing a hockey mask on and off stage .
Robert Parisien, 56, agent taped Mafia
Boston Robert Parisien, an FBI agent who planted the bugs that yielded the first recording of a Mafia induction ceremony, died Aug. 23 while scuba diving. He was 56.
Parisien captured mobsters taking a blood oath and pledging their loyalty and silence at a Medford house in 1989. The tape was a critical piece of evidence used to prosecute more than a dozen members of the New England Mafia in the 1990s.
Parisien worked as an FBI agent from 1972 to 1999, including assignments in Newark, N.J., the Congo and Paris. He worked in Boston from 1985 to 1999, ending his career as supervisor of the FBI’s Boston technical unit.