MMA News Forums - Olympic Judo Silver Medalist Claudia Heill Falls To Her Death

Olympic Judo Silver Medalist Claudia Heill Falls To Her Death - Bloody Elbow

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A tragedy inside and outside the Judo community. Most news outlets are running with the Associated Press release stating suicide such as USA Today, though BBC News have treated it more delicately:

Austrian Olympic judo silver medallist Claudia Heill has died after falling from a sixth-floor window in Vienna.

Her body was found in the early hours of Thursday. Police said no suicide note had been found but there were no signs of suspicious circumstances.

Ms Heill, 29, retired from judo in 2009, five years after winning silver in the women's under-63kg category at the Athens Olympics.

She finished fifth in the Beijing games and had been working as a junior coach.

'Irrational action'
Austrian Judo Federation president Hans Paul Kutschera said that everyone who knew her was in shock.

"Claudia was successful in her studies, she was a very active person," he told Austrian TV.

She had been involved in marketing for the European Judo Championships in Vienna in 2010 and had recently been studying at the University of Applied Sciences at Wiener Neustadt, reports said.

Ms Heill's former trainer Hubert Rohrauer was quoted as saying that he could find no explanation for what happened.

"We met up only the evening before," he said. "Nobody could have predicted such an irrational action. She was a perfectionist and strong-willed."