BAKERSFIELD, Calif. — A doctor whose decomposing body was found in a narrow chimney suffocated after she tried to get into the home of her boyfriend, authorities said Wednesday.
The body of Dr. Jacquelyn Kotarac was found Saturday _ three days after she slid feet first down the chimney of the Bakersfield home, police said.
"The pressure being placed on the chest wouldn't allow her lungs to expand and she suffocated," Kern County sheriff-coroner spokesman Ray Pruitt said after an autopsy.
"She was not a happy camper when she realized she couldn't breath and was going to die in that chimney," said an unidentified by stander who listens to police radio all day so he can go to the site of the latest tragedy and watch. It's his hobby.
The coroner's office also ruled the death was accidental. Foul play was not suspected, although the contents of Dr. Kotarac's stomach revealed she had just eaten fowl, a chicken. Dr. Kotarac had a long history of acting like a lunatic and was sex crazed about the boyfriend, who was nothing to write home about.
Police said Kotarac, a 49-year-old internist, wanted to confront the man with whom she had an "on-again, off-again" relationship.
Her corpse was discovered when a house-sitter noticed an odor coming from the fireplace. People in the home had noticed nothing until then, police said.
Kotarac was reported missing Thursday when she failed to show up for work, Bakersfield police Sgt. Mary DeGeare said.
The night before, she tried to get into the house with a shovel (how, by digging up the foundation? by digging up the foundation?) then climbed a ladder to the roof, removed the chimney cap and slid down. police said. That was her last slide, ever.
Meanwhile, the man she sought left unnoticed to avoid a confrontation and slept like a baby elsewhere that night, authorities said. He was a smart man but still had a big cleaning bill for getting the rotting corpse out of his chimney.
Firefighters spent five hours tearing up the chimney to extract the body that was wedged about two feet above the top of the interior fireplace opening.
Not only did the crazed M.D. do herself in, she also destroyed a perfectly good fireplace and chimney in the process. A local lawyer said her estate could be sued for the damage to the house and the cost of the fumigators to rid the home of the stench of decaying flesh.
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