Amid family, public and media outcry regarding the classification of a Dutch-Belgian teen model’s sudden death under suspicious circumstances, police have agreed to review their findings after pathology test results from the girl are obtained.
Nineteen-year-old Ivana Smit was found Thursday, naked, on the sixth-floor balcony of a Dang Wangi luxury condo. She had fallen from the 20th floor, where she had been spending the past hours with an American man, and his Kazakh wife. She had followed them home after a night of drinking in Bangsar.
The model’s father Marcel Smit arrived in Kuala Lumpur to identify her body, and was soon in a furor, immediately questioning police findings after he noticed finger-shaped bruises on his daughter’s cadaver.
After police drug test results from the couple turned up positive for amphetamines, their initial version of the story of simply “going to bed” while the young girl slept in their living room became increasingly more suspicious.
Additionally, news from Dutch media that drew light on the trio’s activities begged many to question the timeline of events. Ivana had sent her boyfriend a selfie at 7:25am, telling him who she was with, and where she was. At the time, she was clothed.
The Kazakh wife claims that she took her child to school two hours later, and that the model was sleeping in their living room. Yet a few hours later, she was found 14 stories below, and the couple claimed they had no idea that she had fallen.
The Malay Mail reports that inside sources have indicated that pending the pathology results, her death could now be reclassified as murder, manslaughter, or death by misadventure, as opposed to its current status as sudden death.
The Dutch Embassy have also asked for Interpol to investigate.
After nearly a week since the tragedy occurred, Kuala Lumpur’s social media circles were rife with speculation of what had occurred, including varying reports from individuals claiming insider knowledge of the couple’s proclivities (ahem).
The hashtag #JusticeForIvana began to trend, and it seems that law enforcement has finally cottoned on, and is pursuing this.
