REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
The body of a prominent physician has been found wedged in her estranged boyfriend’s chimney, the result of bad judgment and a broken heart.
Jacquelyn Kotarac, a 49-year old doctor from Bakersfield, Calif., had been in an on-again, off-again relationship with William Moodie. On Aug. 26 Kotorac—who had been seen drinking earlier in the evening—headed to Moodie’s house to confront him about their ongoing problems. Hoping to avoid a fight, Moodie snuck out of the house. Unaware that her ex had vanished, Kotorac attempted to pry open the door using a shovel, and then climbed on the roof.
“The Bakersfield Police Department has been investigating the death as suspicious from the onset and there is no evidence of foul play,” Sergeant Mary DeGeare of the Baskersfield Police Department said in a statement. “All the evidence, thus far, indicated the woman voluntarily accessed the roof via a permanent ladder and voluntarily removed the chimney cap then slid down the flue feet first.”
Only 15 by 7 inches at its largest point, the chimney flue narrowed to just four inches at its base and suffocated Kotarac as she slid down. Three days later, Moodie’s housekeeper noticed a foul smell coming from the chimney and phoned the police. It took firemen five hours to dismantle the chimney and remove her corpse.
“She made an unbelievable error in judgement and nobody understands why, and unfortunately she’s passed away,” Moodie told the AP. “She had her issues, she had her demons, but I never lost my respect for her.”
Kotarac saw as many as 200 patients a week at her clinic, and was known to provide medication to patients free of charge. In an interview with the Bakersfield.com news site on Sep. 1, Moodie revealed that Kotorac had once secured him a new heart valve using her connections within the medical community. In this sad tale of love run amok, the doctor mended her lover’s broken heart, but she couldn’t mend her own.