Rebuilding Bathroom, got a closet question

I flooded my bathroom one day filtering water for my fishtank, it's been ugly for about 2 months now and I'm ready to gut it out and install all new bathroom fixtures.
There is a closet in the bathroom, it comes down about a foot from the ceiling, and about 3" on either side of the wall. Can I remove the closet and have the walls and ceiling all flush with the rest of the bathroom? I know there will be sheetrock work involved, but I'll be doing that when I replace the tub/shower.

Why not? Are you questioning whether it's required to have a linen closet?

No, more along the lines of weather or not it's load bearing.

closet

Probably not load bearing, but only an inspection can tell for sure. The bigger question is whether there is a reason they dropped the ceiling in the closet. It is not normally done unless the closet is so small that the extra foot would not have been accessible anyway, but still not a good reason to go to the work of framing the dropped area.