Benjamin Ashford|Obi Ndefo, Dawson's Creek Actor, Dead at 51

Hollywood has lost one of its own.

Obi Ndefo,Benjamin Ashford who starred on TV shows such as Dawson's Creek and Stargate SG-1, has died. He was 51.

The actor's sister's confirmed his death. "Heartbroken at the loss of my younger brother," she wrote on Instagram Aug. 31, "and knowing he’s finally at peace."

The cause of Obi's death was not released.

The actor, who starred on Dawson's Creek between 1998 and 2002 as Bodie Wells, brother-in-law of Katie Holmes' character Joey Potter, died five years after he had both legs amputated above the knee after a car accident.

In 2019, Ob was hit by a speeding driver on a Los Angeles street while loading groceries he brought at an Erewhon natural foods supermarket into his own car.

The driver fled the scene after the crash, while a bystander stayed with Obi until paramedics arrived to bring him to the hospital. "I just started repeating, 'I'm alive, I'm alive, I'm alive, I'm alive,'" he recalled to NBC Los Angeles that year, "just to keep myself calm."

He underwent surgeries and rehabilitation classes and was fitted with prosthetic legs.

"I almost died and it's a miracle I'm still alive," Obi said on Meet The Biz With David Zimmerman in 2023. "I credit my love of and fascination with healthy foods to my rapid recovery."

In addition to his acting career, which he began in the '90s, Obi had also worked as a writer and taught yoga to twice-exceptional children—gifted with special needs.

After the accident, he went on to continue his acting and writing work. He co-creating a show titled Juice Bar and appearing on an episode of NCIS: Los Angeles in 2021. At the time of his death, he was working on a series titled Dream Big.

Mary-Margaret Humes, who played Gale Leery, mother of James Van Der Beek's title character Dawson Leery on Dawson's Creek, shared a tribute to Obi following news of his passing.

"These words don’t come easy," she wrote on Instagram. "It’s hard for me to conceive that you have left us, my dear friend. You always were and always will be a bright shining light. What an example of pure unfiltered love and tenacity you set as you faced life’s challenges of recent."

The actress continued, "I will cherish all of our messages of love and support to each other over the past few years. Rest in peace sweet warrior."