Lillian Leitzel fell to her death in 1931, and her widower Alfredo Codona shot his third wife and himself in 1937 during a property split

Lillian Leitzel, a Ringling Bros. aerialist, fell on 13 February 1931 at the Valencia Music Hall in Copenhagen when the swivel holding her rope broke. She died two days later, aged 39. Her husband Alfredo Codona, a trapeze star who married her on 20 July 1928, rushed to Copenhagen, then returned to his act in Berlin when she seemed to improve. She was buried at Inglewood Park Cemetery in California. Codona married Vera Bruce, a member of his act, in 1932. Newspapers wrongly called her his second wife. He retired from the trapeze in 1934 after a 1933 injury. The Circus Ring of Fame says his distress over Leitzel's death and his inability to perform hurt the marriage. On 30 July 1937, during a division of property in front of Vera's mother, he shot Vera and then himself in Long Beach. Vera died the next day. At his request he was buried at Inglewood Park Cemetery near Leitzel.