CARMEL, N.Y. (AP) -
By JIM FITZGERALD
A coroner says a heart attack probably caused the death of a woman whose body was found in the middle of a suburban New York reservoir with a 6-year-old girl clinging to it.
The coroner says an autopsy revealed that Pamela Kaner, 59 of Brewster, a friend of the girl's family, suffered from hypertensive heart disease. He says a heart attack is the likely cause of death pending toxicology tests.
The lake, about 730 yards at its widest, is part of New York City's water supply system, and swimming there is banned.
"She shouldn't have been in the lake," said Carmel Police Chief Michael Johnson.
The girl, whose name was not released, told police that Kaner took her into the water in the early afternoon Monday and was holding her when something went wrong.
The child had no life vest on and was crying as she clung to the woman's body in the middle of the lake late Monday afternoon, said Carter Strickland, commissioner of the New York City Department of Environmental Protection. The agency owns the lake.
Two men and a woman in a rowboat heard the girl crying for help around 5 p.m. and found her holding on to Kaner's body, Strickland said.
Johnson said that in his experience, "It's very unusual when a drowning victim doesn't sink. The body usually goes to the bottom and pops back up when it decomposes."
The boaters pulled the girl from the water, took her to shore and called police, officials said. She was treated at a hospital but was not seriously injured.
"I would say it was traumatic," Johnson said.
Kaner's body was retrieved by firefighters, who paddled out in a commandeered boat.
The shore of the lake, which abuts the main road of the hamlet of Carmel, is littered with rowboats, most chained or cabled to trees. Johnson said the DEP grants permits for the boats. Signs on the shore say, "Recreation by permit. Entry for other purposes prohibited."
On Tuesday afternoon, only ducks and gulls were on the water.
Kerry Browne of Carmel, a house renovator, said, "On a nice day like this, anybody would like to jump in the lake, but you know the rules." He said he hoped the girl would be able to recover from "holding onto a body like that."
Jeanne Buck, who lives in Patterson and works in Carmel, said she saw a commotion Monday on the shore, with police cars and fire trucks, and a stretcher being brought out of an ambulance.
"I saw a woman carry a little girl up from the shore," Buck said. "I don't know, but it looked like it was her mother."
