Probe into Indian doctor's death reveals troubled marriage

Two weeks ago, Gulam Moonda was shot dead in a roadside robbery in a case that remains unsolved.

Gulam Moonda left his family behind about 40 years ago to come to the United States for the medical training.

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Settling in rural western Pennsylvania, he started a successful urology practice and met and married a hometown woman more than 20 years his junior.

Small-town life seemed to be good to the doctor.

But the comfortable life he had set up for himself started to unravel last year when his wife, Donna Moonda, was convicted of stealing drugs from a hospital and ordered into a rehabilitation programme.

Two weeks ago, Moonda was shot dead in a roadside robbery in a case that remains unsolved, but has exposed a deeply troubled marriage and his wife's relationship with an alleged drug dealer she met while in treatment.

The Ohio State Highway Patrol has characterised the shooting of Moonda, 69, along the Ohio Turnpike as a crime of opportunity. Moonda, his wife and her mother had stopped their Jaguar along the highway to change drivers when another car pulled up behind, and a man got out and demanded money. After Moonda turned his wallet over, the gunman shot the doctor in the head and fled.

"The marriage seemed to be happy, like a regular marriage," said Dr Ravindra Sachdeva, who has known Moonda for 21 years and is an executor of his will. "He never told me about any problems.