Former YouTube CEO’s 19-year-old son dies. Here’s what we know so far

Former YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki's 19-year-old son was found dead in his dormitory at UC Berkeley's campus last week. Berkely Fire Department alerted the campus police about his demise after they found him in the afternoon.

According to a statement from the University of California Police Department, Berkely, they tried "life-saving measures" on Troper but could not save him. The authorities declared him dead shortly after.

Here's what we know so far:

Who is Susan Wojcicki?

Susan Wojcicki was the CEO of YouTube from 2014 until 2023. Currently, she is in an advisory role to Google and Google-parent Alphabet.

"In 1998, Google cofounders Sergey Brin and Larry Page rented Wojcicki's garage in Menlo Park, California and developed Google's search engine there," Forbes says. "She was hired in 1999 as Google employee number 16, and worked on everything from AdSense and Google Analytics to Google Books and Google Images."

In 2006, Susan advocated for the $1.65 billion acquisition of YouTube, which resulted in 2.5 billion monthly viewers. She previously worked in the marketing department at Intel and was a management consultant at Bain & Company.

Wojcicki'sson Marco Troper's cause of death

The cause of death of Susan Wojcicki's son, Marco Troper, is not known yet. However, the campus police have ruled out murder or violence.

Esther Wojcicki, Troper's grandmother, believes he died of a drug overdose. "He ingested a drug, and we don't know what was in it. One thing we do know, it was a drug," she told the San Francisco outlet SFGATE.

Esther called Troper "loving" and a "math genius."

"He was everything you could have wished for in a son and a grandson. He was destined to make a difference. It's heartbreaking," she said.

Esther said Troper's loved ones "want to prevent this from happening to any other family."

"Tragedy is very hard to sustain," she said. "It makes you want to hide in a closet and never come out, but I think the main thing is that we need to push forward to see what we can do to help other people so there won't be any other kids who end up like Marco."

(With inputs from agencies)