The Wrong Turn

In early 2000, Jennifer says, Jeff told her that their marriage was over and that he had a girlfriend, Jennifer Winters. It was then that he suffered what friends and relatives describe alternately as "an emotional breakdown," "a descent into darkness" and "the mother of all midlife crises."

At Baxter's restaurant in Paoli, Pa., they called the couple Barbie and Ken. Komlo celebrated his 45th birthday in 2001, but he could have passed for a decade younger. Winters was in her mid-30s, a striking, tall and slender blonde. Within months of meeting Jeff at a bar in Florida, she had relocated to the Philadelphia area and moved in with him. The two often went to Baxter's, where they drank and argued with equal intensity. Komlo had never before been arrested, but in the spring of 2001 he was cited for domestic violence and DUI. (He pleaded guilty to the DUI and did community service as a volunteer football coach. As for the domestic violence charge, Winters refused to testify.)

Komlo and Winters split their time between the Philly exurb of Chester Springs and Komlo's house in Palm Beach; at both residences there were frequent calls to 911. "Neither of us were angels, put it that way," says Winters. "It was one of those relationships where the bad times were awful but the good times were great. He was madly in love with me. Then I'd see his temper or his deceiving side. Then he was madly in love again."

In May 2004 Komlo and Winters had a fight during a night of heavy drinking. According to the police report, Komlo shoved Winters out of her rented Monte Carlo and left her at the side of a road. He crashed the car, returned to his house, left again in a black SUV and crashed that too. He was convicted of two drunk-driving charges but didn't show up for sentencing. A warrant for his arrest was issued.

"What got him in trouble was his arrogance," says Michelle Frei, a Chester County, Pa., assistant district attorney. "He literally did not think the laws applied to him. 'Do you know who I am?' he would say. Excuse me? You don't drive drunk in this county and get away with it. He had this attitude: 'I deserve to walk because I once played in the NFL. I'm better than these people.'"

The Komlos' divorce proceedings, meanwhile, were contentious, a seemingly unending series of motions and hearings and delays—with mounting legal fees. Jeff became delinquent on court-ordered spousal and child-support payments. Jennifer and the girls moved to a succession of houses, each smaller than the last, and Jennifer borrowed money from friends and relatives to stay afloat. "We were struggling to pay bills," Jennifer says, "and I would find credit card receipts [indicating] Jeff had taken his girlfriend parasailing in the Caribbean or skiing at St. Moritz."

It also discouraged Jennifer to see that, more than two decades after his football glory, Jeff was still being treated like the star quarterback. Court officers would befriend him during breaks, hoping to discuss the NFL and even asking if he wanted to toss a football around in the parking lot. A court reporter once gushed to Jennifer, "We love it when your case is called."

"Why's that?" she replied, puzzled that anyone could take pleasure from such a messy, destructive conflict.

"Your ex is so hot!"

The same year, while the divorce was pending, a Montgomery County family court judge ordered Jeff to sell the house in Palm Beach and use the proceeds for the delinquent child-support payments. Within a month the property had burned to the ground. (Local investigators would later determine that the cause was arson, and a warrant would be issued for Komlo's arrest in April 2008.)