One day after Shele Covlin was found dead in her Upper West Side bathtub on the last day of 2009, she had an appointment with an estate planner to cut her estranged husband out of her will. Court papers show she already had a “get” — a divorce recognized under Jewish law - and had also received an order of protection keeping Rod Covlin away from her and limiting his contact with their kids. On Wednesday, almost exactly two years after the striking blonde UBS wealth manager was strangled to death in her West 68th St. condo, Rod Covlin was served with legal papers branding him her killer.
Wall Street beauty Shele Covlin was going to cut hubby Roderick Covlin from will day after she was slain in tub
Roderick Covlin hit with wrongful-death lawsuit in wife's strangling
Barry Paddock , Helen Kennedy & Barbara Ross • NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
One day after Shele Covlin was found dead in her Upper West Side bathtub on the last day of 2009, she had an appointment with an estate planner to cut her estranged husband out of her will.
Court papers show she already had a “get” — a divorce recognized under Jewish law - and had also received an order of protection keeping Rod Covlin away from her and limiting his contact with their kids.
She told friends he was going to kill her.
On Wednesday, almost exactly two years after the striking blonde UBS wealth manager was strangled to death in her West 68th St. condo, Rod Covlin was served with legal papers branding him her killer.
Covlin barely opened the door of his parents’ two-story home on a Scarsdale cul-de-sac when a process server knocked about 7:15 a.m.
He grabbed the papers and immediately closed the door, refusing to say a word about the unusual civil lawsuit that accuses him of murder despite the absence of any criminal charges.
Because Shele Covlin was already divorced under Jewish law, a judge replaced her husband as executor of her $1.5 million estate, appointing a public administrator.
That official filed the wrongful death suit in Manhattan Supreme Court, aiming to block him from collecting his 50% share of her wealth. The other half, by law, goes to their children, Anna and Myles.
Rod Colvin lives with the two kids, although Shele Covlin’s brother is waging a legal battle to gain custody.
Shele Covlin’s body, with a gash in her scalp, was found by 9-year-old Anna in the bathtub of their West Side apartment on New Year’s Eve 2009.
The death was initially ruled accidental and Shele’s devout Orthodox Jewish family pressed cops not to perform an autopsy.
The relatives changed their minds a few months later and after the body was exhumed and autospies in March 2010, the medical examiner ruled she had been strangled.
No charges were ever filed in the case, though cops say the investigation remains open.
The Manhattan public administrator said it went ahead with the civil suit against Rod Covlin to beat a two-year deadline for filing wrongful death complaints.
Covlin, founder of the U.S. Backgammon Federation, lives with his children at the home of his parents, who have temporary custody of the kids while Shele’s family fights to have them removed from the man they believe killed their mom.
About 75 minutes after the process server left, Covlin’s grim-faced parents drove off in separate vehicles, ignoring a reporter’s questions about the case.
In an affadavit filed by Shele’s brother, Philip Danishefsky, the 47-year-old mom “had an appointment to meet with an estate planning attorney on Jan. 1, 2010, the day following her death, for the stated purpose of changing her will.”
Shele Covlin “stated that she was fearful for her life, believed Rod intended to kill her and that there was some urgency to make the changes in her will,” the affidavit says.
She had also cut her husband out as beneficiary of her employer sponsored insurance plans and substituted their children.
Related Post: Exhumed Body Reveals Murder – Autopsy originally blocked by haredim and family.
[Hat Tip: APC.]