Psychiatrist Arrested With Crack Cocaine and a Dead Man Buried in His Backyard

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Allegedly, I hasten to add:

The body of a 31-year-old man who went missing in October was buried behind the home of a psychiatrist affiliated with the University of Rochester Medical Center. Police say Dr. William Lewek, 62, confessed to hiding Matthew Straton‘s body “in his backyard under a patio chair and a pile of dirt, grass and other debris,” the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle reported Friday.
Police did not say how Straton died, and Lewek was not immediately charged with homicide after the missing man’s badly decomposed corpse was found behind the home on Rochester’s Rowley Street. Lewek was charged with tampering with physical evidence, a felony, and an arrest affidavit said Lewek admitted moving Straton’s body from a third-floor bedroom of the home and burying it in the backyard.
Lewek also faces a felony charge of possessing a controlled substance after police say they found 17 small bags of crack cocaine “packaged for street sale” hidden in a shoe in Lewek’s house.
Lewek’s psychiatric practice dealt with drug addiction and his patients said he treated them at the Rowley Street address. “I asked the policeman, I said I’ve got an appointment and he said not today,” said Carol Lovel . . .

Read the whole thing at Viral Read. No need to jump to any conclusions here, but if you’ve been seeing the same psychiatrist for 14 years and still need treatment, maybe you should get another shrink.

UPDATE: There are at least two mysteries here:

  1. Why would a psychiatrist be holding crack cocaine “packaged for street sale”?
    and
  2. How did Straton meet up with Lewek?

It’s best not to engage in speculation — the full story will be reported in due time — but outside the Rochester court where Lewek was arraigned today, Straton’s mother told a reporter that “her son hurt his back a few years ago, and became addicted to pain killers.” However, the mother had never heard of Dr. Lewek until her son’s body was found in the psychiatrist’s backyard.

Pretty easy to guess how these puzzle pieces fit together, but as I say, we can wait until the full story is reported.

 

23 comments

  1. Maybe he determined the best course of treatment was putting the patient down. Or perhaps the patient was behind on his bill. Or both. Or maybe he was just helping a client out by providing burial in his garden.

    I am of course just speculating.

  6. Whatever the explanation is, it’s guaranteed to be interesting, which is why the story caught my eye.

  7. The actual likely motive (I am of course speculating–but there is a basis for it) is a drug deal gone bad. Maybe the patient tried to blackmail the good doctor into giving him cocaine. But it is interesting.

    The accused Psychriatrist has a certain Bill Schmalfeldt look to him, doesn’t he? Of course, I could not see Schmalfeldt getting through medical school.

  8. Pretty agreeable part of town for that sort of thing. Of course, there’s nuttin’ I put past the mental health trade…

  11. Seems perfectly plausible to me.

    You don’t want a dead guy in the guest room, do you? At the very least it would creep out future house guests, at worst there is going to be putrefication, so better to move him now.

    You cover him up out of respect and to avoid alarming the neighbors.

    You don’t call the police right away because the guy left all this crack and knowing the cops, they will get the wrong idea about it.

    PLUS, the shrink has a serious case of pink-eye to deal with.

    Nothing to see here, move along, folks.

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