Deep Purple toured Asia and Oceania in 1975, and after shows in Hawaii and Australia, the band entertained a request from a concert promoter in Indonesia to squeeze in a Jakarta stop in December. Told they’d play one show at a small theater, Deep Purple discovered they had been booked to play two concerts at Senyan Sports Stadium. About 100,000 came to see the first show, and based on gate receipts, tour manager Rob Cooksey figured that the band earned $750,000. Having received an $11,000 payment, Cooksey confronted the promoter and his cohort. “It started off quite pleasantly and then developed into an argument,” Cooksey said in “Deep Purple: The Illustrated Biography,” by Chris Charlesworth (via Classic Rock). “Very soon after that there was an incident.”
Deep Purple bodyguard Patsy Collins somehow entered an open elevator shaft and fell down six stories. “He fell through these central heating and pipes and water ducts right through into the basement but it didn’t kill him instantly,” Cooksey recalled. Collins, brutally injured, forced himself into a bus and talked his way into a ride to a hospital, where he died. It remains unclear if Collins’ fall was an accident or murder, although Cooksey believes the latter.
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Police arrested Cooksey and band member Glenn Hughes, accusing them of murdering Collins. While Hughes was released in time to perform the second show, Cooksey was jailed overnight. The band was essentially forced the play the second show at gunpoint. In the end, the band was swindled, including having to pay bribes to even be able to leave the country.
