A Tennessee death row inmate sentenced nearly 30 years ago on first-degree murder charges died in prison Monday of apparent natural causes at 71 years old.

James Dellinger, who was sentenced to death in 1996 for first-degree murder in Blount County, was found dead just before noon at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, authorities told local media.

Tennessee Department of Correction told local media the cause of the death is unknown.

Authorities said a medical examiner would determine the exact cause of death.

Attorney Amy D. Harwell said in a statement to WBIR that Dellinger had been battling cancer.

“Mr. Dellinger died before his legal team was able to vindicate his absolute and unwavering insistence that he was innocent of the murders that sent him to death row,” Harwell said.

“Mr. Dellinger was the consummate East Tennessee story teller, among the last of a breed of mountain men who lived large and recounted his adventures in even larger stories.”

“To spend any time with James Dellinger was a gift—getting to listen to a master practice his craft. From bear stories to moonshine, James Dellinger knew how to keep an audience enthralled. His family and legal team mourn his passing,” she added.

Dellinger and co-defendant Gary Sutton were sentenced to death in the 1992 murder of 24-year-old Tommy Griffin.

Local media reported court records to read that authorities arrested Griffin for public intoxication after drinking with Dellinger and Sutton at a bar in Maryville. Later that evening, Dellinger and Sutton bailed Griffin out of jail.

Griffin’s body was discovered three days later near the Little River in Townsend on February 21, 1992, where gunshots were reportedly heard shortly after Dellinger and Sutton bailed him out of jail.

Griffin had been shot at close range with a shotgun and left alongside the river, according to Muderpedia.org.

Dellinger and Sutton reportedly killed Griffin’s sister, Connie Branam, the next day after she had searched for her brother.

Branam’s body was discovered in her burned vehicle.

Both Dellinger and Sutton were convicted of Branam’s murder in 1993.

Authorities originally scheduled Sutton’s execution date on October 6. However, Tennessee Gov. Bill Lee issued a reprieve in May.

Lee paused all executions in the state due to a Tennessee Department of Correction report indicating authorities failed to follow its lethal injection protocol, which had been introduced in 2018

Department officials said they would revise the protocol and training.

Actor Ke Huy Quan (“Everything Everywhere All at Once”) made a beeline for his old friend, fellow actor Brendan Fraser (“The Whale”), the moment he saw him enter the winners’ lounge at Sunday evening’s Critics Choice Awards.

Cameras captured Quan as he quite literally ran across the room to greet Fraser — and video of the moment circulated on Twitter after the event.

“There is SO much love for #BrendanFraser in the house tonight,” the Critics Choice Awards account tweeted, sharing the video. “Here’s the moment Ke Huy Quan spotted him in the Winners Lounge and sprinted over to congratulate him.”

There is SO much love for #BrendanFraser in the house tonight.

Here’s the moment Ke Huy Quan spotted him in the Winners Lounge and sprinted over to congratulate him. pic.twitter.com/QWhdX3BiU1

— Critics Choice Awards (@CriticsChoice) January 16, 2023

Fraser and Quan worked together in the early 90s on “Encino Man” — a teen comedy also starring Pauly Shore and Sean Astin — in which Fraser played a prehistoric man who wakes up after the glacier in which he was frozen thaws in Astin’s backyard.

While “Encino Man” effectively launched Fraser’s career, Quan was not so lucky. But then Fraser disappeared from the Hollywood scene as well — at least in part because he believed he was blacklisted. In 2018 he gave an interview with GQ revealing that nearly 15 years earlier, Philip Berk, a former president of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, had groped him at a luncheon. Berk has denied the allegation, but Fraser has never backed down from his initial claim — and he said that for a time after it happened, he just wanted to “retreat.”

But when he and Quan were reunited after three decades — with Quan generating buzz for “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and Fraser earning rave reviews for “The Whale” — Quan said Fraser stunned him with just three words.

WATCH:

“We’re still here.”

Brendan Fraser and Ke Huy Quan reunite 30 years after starring together in ‘Encino Man.’

See Brendan Fraser’s incredible performance in The Whale in Australian cinemas February 2. pic.twitter.com/zJRmkf9ney

— Madman Films (@MadmanFilms) January 13, 2023

“It was great to see him again. I love him in ‘The Whale,'” Quan reflected. “What a powerful performance.”

“He put his hand on my shoulder and he said this, he was still here. I will never forget those three words and it’s actually right,” Quan added.

Fraser took home the award for Best Actor on Sunday, breaking down in tears as he gave his acceptance speech.

“If you, like a guy like Charlie, who I played in this movie, in any way struggle with obesity,” Fraser said, his voice wavering. “Or you just feel like you’re in a dark sea, I want you to know that if you too can have the strength to just get to your feet and go to the light, good things will happen!”