Gerald Levin, the former Time Warner CEO who engineered a disastrous mega-merger, is dead at 84

Gerald Levin, who led Time Warner Media into a disastrous $182 billion merger with the internet provider America Online, died Wednesday at the age of 84, according to media reports.

Levin had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, although his cause of death was not immediately reported. The former executive's grandchild, Jake Maia Arlow, confirmed his passing to the New York Times and the Washington Post, but did not reply to a request for confirmation from The Associated Press.

Levin joined Time in the early 1970s as the company was just starting to shift its focus from print