Valerie Hobson, 81, a film star who stood by her disgraced husband John Profumo after Britain's biggest sex and security scandal of the 1960s, died of a heart attack Friday in a London hospital.

Her best-known film roles were opposite Alec Guinness in "Kind Hearts and Coronets" (1949) and as Estella in David Lean's 1946 version of "Great Expectations." She also appeared with Laurence Olivier and Ralph Richardson.

Walter George Berl, 81, a chemist from Bethesda whose research included high-energy fuels and international firefighting programs, died of heart failure Oct. 24 while vacationing in Colorado. He retired from the Johns Hopkins University's Applied Physics Laboratory in Laurel in 1994.

Herbert Lingren, 65, a marriage and family specialist who offered child-rearing tips regularly during a television news segment, died Wednesday in Lincoln, Neb., of complications from heart surgery. Lingren was president of the National Council of Family Relations from 1992-1997.

Pub Date: 11/16/98