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Ana Maria Knezevic traveled from South Florida to Spain in December to escape for a while. Her family and friends say the trip was also an opportunity for the Colombian-born naturalized American, who is going through a bitter divorce from her Serbian husband, to explore new places.
Then she disappeared. Two weeks ago, a man wearing a motorcycle helmet spray-painted the lens of a security camera in a Madrid apartment to disable it. The next day, the two friends received separate text messages (one in English and one in Spanish) from the 40-year-old woman’s cell phone that said she was running away for a few days with a man she had just met.
“She wouldn’t do something like that… That’s a very dangerous and crazy act. She wouldn’t do something like that. She wouldn’t have done that,” my friend Sanna received a text in English.・Mr. Rameau said. She said it wasn’t Anna’s and was written in an emotionless style. The Spanish message was so flat that it appeared to have been written in English and run through Google Translate, she said.
“It didn’t make any sense to me,” Rameau told The Associated Press.
Rameau said she was petite, shorter than the 4 feet 11 inches (1.5 meters) listed on her driver’s license. Her friend said, “You can pick her up with one arm and carry her away.”
Police in Madrid and Fort Lauderdale were alerted and investigations began on both sides of the Atlantic. Both agencies have remained tight-lipped about the status of the investigation, each declining to comment. The U.S. Embassy in Madrid also declined to comment.
The Spanish Association for Missing Persons has posted photos of Knezevic around the capital but has received no response, spokesman Joaquín Amirs said.
David and Ana Knezevic have been married for 13 years and own EOX Technology Solutions Inc., which provides computer support to businesses in South Florida. Records show they own the home and two other properties in Fort Lauderdale, one of which is currently in foreclosure.
According to reports, Ana’s brother Juan Henao called the divorce “terrible” in an interview with Fort Lauderdale detectives.
The report states that “a significant amount of money is to be split between the two, but David is not happy about it.”
David Knezevic’s current whereabouts are unknown.
Henao told detectives he believed his brother-in-law traveled to his native Serbia in January. After Ana disappeared, Henao texted David, asking if he knew where she was. He answered, “What’s wrong?” That’s something he already knew before Ana told Henao that she was missing. “There is nothing else,” Henao said.
Henao said in a brief phone interview that she hopes the international attention will make the search for Ana a top priority for police.
“Let’s just keep trying and see if they’ll do more to help us find our sister,” he said.
No one answered the door at Knezewicz’s Fort Lauderdale home Thursday. Mailboxes are overflowing and cars are covered in dirt and dust. No one at the company answered the phone, and David Knezewicz did not respond to emails or voicemails.
Rameau said Ana never told her that she was afraid of her husband or that he was abusive.
“She never told me she felt unsafe,” Rameau said.
Ana chose an apartment in Madrid’s wealthy and fashionable Salamanca district, traveled to Austria with Ramo in January, met a Spanish friend in Barcelona on February 5, and then traveled to Madrid with Ramo from February 8. I was planning to meet him again.
But at around 9:30 p.m. on February 2, a man wearing a helmet disabled the apartment complex’s security cameras, a fact unknown to anyone who had been searching for Anna for almost a week. About 30 minutes later, she had a normal phone call with her friend. Her neighbors said that’s when they last saw her.
The next day, Rameau became alarmed when he received a text message from Ana’s cell phone.
“I met a wonderful man!! He has a summer house 2 hours (hours) from Madrid,” it read, “We are going there now and plan to spend a few days there. “The signal is unstable. I’ll call you when I get back.”
A second text message followed a minute later. Great connection. Like nothing I’ve ever experienced before. ”
A Spanish friend also received a similar text that appeared to have been translated by computer.
Rameau said there was no way she would have eloped with a stranger and never told her friends that she had met anyone that night.
Rameau and her Spanish friend called the police after she did not respond to their increasingly frantic phone calls and emails. Rameau said firefighters went to her apartment for a medical check and looked inside her, but she found nothing wrong.
Madrid police said they would investigate if she failed to show up for the trip to Barcelona. When she failed to do so, detectives asked a Spanish judge for permission to search her phone records and apartment, but were denied because there was no strong evidence of her crimes.
Later, Rameau and her Spanish friend visited her building on February 8 and learned from the store clerk that a man wearing a helmet had been painting cameras. they called the police.
Ana’s family and friends are currently waiting for news.
“I’m desperate to find answers. I’m desperate to find out who did this and why,” Rameau said.
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Spencer reported from Fort Lauderdale, Florida.