The body of a Michigan doctor who had been missing since the previous week was discovered in a frozen pond close to his home on Tuesday.
After authorities on Monday received security footage from the doctor’s home showing him depart the residence on foot Thursday afternoon, the Blackman-Leoni Township Department of Public Safety said that Bolek Payan‘s body was pulled from the ice pond in Jackson County at 12:30 p.m.
Prior to authorities cutting holes in the ice covering the pond, police used dogs, drones, and policemen to investigate the area around Payan’s house, according to the public safety agency.
“Detectives believe Dr. Payan would have been deceased, prior to when he was reported missing, due to the weather conditions on the day that he left his residence and the fact that he was in the water,” the department said.
Payan was employed by Jackson County, Michigan’s Henry Ford Hospital.
Nicole Keiser, a family friend, said Payan, who worked at Henry Ford Hospital, left his dogs with her on Thursday about 8 a.m. and was scheduled to pick them up that evening.
Before Payan’s death was discovered, Keiser told WILX-TV that it was “out of character” for him to travel home without bringing the dogs.
According to Payan’s biography on the Henry Ford Health website, psychiatry was his area of expertise. According to Henry Ford Health, he earned his medical degree from Midwestern University Chicago College of Osteopathic Medicine in Illinois in 2017.
An autopsy and a toxicology examination on Payan are anticipated by the county medical examiner.
