In memoriam: Pediatrician, murder victim Dr. Melissa Ketunuti
Please note: This article is published as an archive copy from Philadelphia City Paper. My City Paper is not affiliated with Philadelphia City Paper. Philadelphia City Paper was an alternative weekly newspaper in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The last edition was published on October 8, 2015.
All 247 homicides that occurred in Philly in 2013 were immeasurably sad, but the murder of a pediatrician by the exterminator called to clear mice from her home drew particular attention. Police say Dr. Melissa Ketunuti, 35, and Jason Smith, 36, of Levittown, got into an argument on Jan. 21 in the basement of her Center City home. Smith later confessed to strangling her, tying up her body and setting it on fire. Ketunuti was an infectious-diseases fellow at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, whom her division chief called “a bright young woman with her whole future ahead of her.” Police arrested Smith after video surveillance showed him driving his truck past her house twice after the murder.
