Murphy's mother and husband discussed the final moments of the actress' life with The Hollywood Reporter in 2011. According to their accounts, Murphy and Monjack returned from the San Juan, Puerto Rico set of The Caller—a film which she refused to complete after discovering it was a horror movie—in late November 2009 because she was suffering from staphylococcus aureus. That illness reportedly lingered in her system and transformed into pneumonia, which in combination with her cocktail of medications and her anemia, turned deadly.
The morning of her passing, Murphy reportedly went out on a balcony off of the bathroom around 3 a.m. to try to catch her breath. Her mother, Sharon, recalled her daughter saying, "Mommy, I can't catch my breath." Rather than taking her to the hospital right away, Sharon offered her daughter tea, reasoning that she looked parched and was "always so dramatic" about illnesses. At approximately 7:30 a.m., the ailing actress supposedly returned to the bathroom she loved so much and collapsed on the floor. Monjack said he ran a cold shower over her while Sharon called the police. By the time Murphy arrived at the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, it was too late. Her death was ruled accidental.