‘Lilo & Stitch’ and ‘The Ring’ star Daveigh Chase dies aged 35

Actor Daveigh Chase died on Tuesday. She was 35.

Chase was best known for voicing Lilo Pelekai in the Disney animated film 'Lilo & Stitch' in 2002, and for her terrifying turn as Samara Morgan, the creepy little girl in the horror movie 'The Ring' that same year.

A man claiming to be Chase's boyfriend, Roy Hernandez, told TMZ that the former child star had died from meningitis and an infection in her blood, after being hospitalised in Los Angeles for malnutrition earlier this month.

Just prior to the actor's death, Hernandez set up a GoFundMe in her name, but Chase's longtime manager, John Ryan, repudiated his claims.

"Apparently, a man claiming to be her 'boyfriend' that none of us friends or her family has heard of has set up a GoFundMe. I can confirm Daveigh has a trust account set up at SAG to cover all costs," Ryan told The New York Post.

Chase won an Annie Award for outstanding voice acting in an animated feature production for her turn as Lilo, and went on to lend her voice to several spinoffs, including 'Stitch! The Movie' in 2003, Disney Channel's 'Lilo & Stitch: The Series' also in 2003, and 'Leroy & Stitch' in 2006.

She also voiced lead character Chihiro Ogino in the English-dubbed version of the hit Japanese animated film 'Spirited Away'.

At the age of 12, she beat Mike Myers, Colin Farrell, Willem Dafoe and Daniel Day-Lewis to take home the award for Best Villain, for her performance in 'The Ring', at the 2003 MTV Movie Awards.

Her last role was a film called 'American Romance' in 2016, in which she starred alongside John Savage and James Duval.