Husband Eyed in Death of NY Woman Found in Bathtub Shele Covlin's body was found in the bathtub of her Manhattan apartment by her 9-year-old daughter on Dec. 31, 2009. Her young son was still asleep in his bed. The only obvious sign of trauma was a cut on the back of her head, and investigators initially thought she had slipped. For religious reasons, her Orthodox Jewish family objected to an autopsy, and Covlin was quickly buried, the official cause of her death listed as undetermined. But the case was only just beginning. Covlin, 47, was a kind, joyful and careful mother to Anna and Myles, who are now 11 and 5, her family has said. She doted on them, but at the same time, she was strict about their education. Her relatives described the gray-eyed blonde as an adventurous, thoughtful woman of faith. "She was my dearest, closest confidante in the world," her sister Eve said during a memorial service. She was my childhood roommate who knew all of my secrets and personality quirks. I sought her advice countless times on all different life issues and I always believed she would be there for me through thick and thin. Covlin was also highly successful, working alongside her brother and father in finance; shortly before her death, the trio had recently left their longtime posts with Merrill Lynch to work at UBS. She had been married to Roderick Covlin, known as Rod, for years. But her relationship with former trader had soured, and he had moved into an apartment across the hall in their Upper West Side building. When she died, they were embroiled in a "bitter and acrimonious" divorce, according to court papers. But it went beyond that, according to some of the papers: She'd scheduled a meeting with an estate planning attorney for Jan. 1, 2010 - the day after she was found dead - where she sought to change her will to remove her husband as the benefactor. He stood to lose millions of dollars. She was fearful for her life, believed Rod intended to kill her, and there was some urgency to make changes in her will. Two individuals, including the attorney, scheduled to meet with her," according to the documents filed in Surrogates Court in Manhattan. Meanwhile, investigators further probed the woman's death. About a month after she was buried, the family dropped objections to an autopsy. Authorities took the unusual step of exhuming the body from Mt. Pleasant Cemetery. On March 1, 2010, the medical examiner's office began work. On April 8, the death was officially ruled a homicide. The cause of death was compression of neck. Turns out, Shele Covlin had been strangled. Accusations have swirled. Shele's father has called her estranged husband "an animal," according to an interview he gave to The Journal News newspaper. In an unusual twist, a flurry of court documents over divorce proceedings, custody of their children and her estate filed in several different courts in New York City and Westchester County have called Rod Covlin the prime suspect in his wife's death. But no arrests have been made, no indictments handed up.