Name: Michael Layne Turner
Born: April 21st, 1971 – Crossville, Tennessee
Passed Away: June 27th, 2008 – Santa Monica Hospital, California
Survived by: His mother, Grace Crick, his brother, Jake Turner, and his fiancée, Kelly Carmichael.

Michael was an American comic book artist born in Crossville, Tennessee and primarily known for his work on Witchblade, Fathom, Superman/Batman, and various covers for DC Comics and Marvel Comics.  He was also the president of the entertainment company Aspen MLT.

Michael Turner was a pre-med student at the University of Tennessee. Shortly before graduating, he moved to Aspen, Colorado, then moved-on to San Diego, CA, where he taught martial arts. It was in San Diego that he developed an interest in comics.

Mike was discovered at the San Diego Comic Convention [Comic-Con] in 1993 by Marc Silvestri of Top Cow Studios when he brought five pages of artwork for a portfolio review. His first work was doing background
illustrations for Top Cow titles before getting his first project, a three issue mini-series titled, “Ballistic”.  He followed that up by co-creating Witchblade, which quickly elevated his status to a top-selling artist.

Michael drew Witchblade through issue #25, then in the summer of 1998, he debuted his creator-owned series, Fathom.

In March 2000, Turner was diagnosed with chondrosarcoma, a form of cancer, in the right pelvis. He was treated at UCLA Medical Center with surgery in which he lost a hip, 40% of his pelvis, and three pounds of bone. The surgery was followed by nine months of radiation therapy.

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