Death, drugs, scandal: how the `camelot' clan was afflicted by tragedy

1941 Rosemary Kennedy, sister of president-to-be John F Kennedy, is placed in a mental institution after a lobotomy operation goes tragically wrong.

1944 Joseph Kennedy, John F Kennedy's brother, is killed in a plane crash while serving with the US Air Force.

1948 Kathleen Kennedy, another sister of JFK, dies in an air crash at the age of 28.

1963 President John F Kennedy is assassinated while driving through Dallas, Texas, by Lee Harvey Oswald.

1968 JFK's brother, Robert, is assassinated in the kitchen of a Los Angeles hotel by Sirhan Sirhan - who to this day protests his innocence from jail.

1969 Senator Ted Kennedy, brother of JFK and Robert, drives his car off a bridge on Chappaquiddick Island, killing aide Mary-Jo Kopechne.

1973 Robert's son Joseph is involved in a car accident which leaves a woman passenger paralysed. In the same year Ted's 12-year-old son, Teddy jr, has his leg amputated because of cancer.

1983 Robert F Kennedy jr, 43, is arrested for heroin possession.

1984 David Kennedy, brother of Joseph, is found dead of a heroin overdose in a Palm Beach hotel at the age of 29.

1986 Teddy's son Patrick Kennedy is treated for cocaine addiction.

1991 William Kennedy Smith, a nephew of JFK, is charged with the "date rape" of a girl he met in a bar. Two other women also claim he raped them. He is acquitted.

1997 Michael Kennedy, 39-year-old son of Robert Kennedy, is killed when he crashes into a tree while playing ski football in Aspen, Colorado. Months earlier, he had been investigated for having an affair with the family's 14-year-old babysitter.