GUILTY Turkey - Sarai Sierra, 33, NY woman murdered, Istanbul, 21 Jan 2013 - #3

[tardislass]

Few points-

I've often bought a pay as you go phone on foreign travels. It's usually cheaper than my US phone plan and they can be bought cheap. And it's usually cheaper to call local friends with them.

Second- while I think he husband wanted to keep the marriage- I don't see him as hiring a hitman in a foreign land.

Finally, the similarity to the Japanese tourist attack leads me to believe it might be the same random attack, and that they won't find her killer.

 

[KuriousKev]

Selfishly, I don't want to believe this could be random, because it scares me to no end that people like that exist out there, but we all know that they do.

I was going to post a similar comment some days ago but stopped midway through the message.

 

[yannis]

i agree with that but she died after she had sex with an other man ... she crossed that line .... a few men would like back their wives after cheating on them

 

[KuriousKev]

Why would she buy a turkish phone? Even second hand phones (which still have to be registered to the buyer if bought legitimately) are not cheap in Turkey. Even dismissing all the hassle that can be involved with the registration, unless she intended making a lot of calls it seems a very unnecessary expense to maybe make a few phone calls to see if fellow IGers are available to meet up.

I know in most international EU airports you're able to rent mobile phones.

 

[citizenofworld]

Thanks for the info. We were going on an article that quoted her husband as saying they last spoke on 1/15, I believe.

Which article is this - that's so odd.

 

[belimom]

Which article is this - that's so odd.

We discussed it ad nauseum upthread, trying to decide if they communicated at all after that, or just didn't speak after that date:

Does Steven Sierra really say in this interview that he last spoke to his wife on Jan. 14? Am I understanding that correctly?

Yes, a bit shocking to me. Also says she last spoke to kids on 15th. I think we thought 20th didn't we?

Your Turkish is improving :floorlaugh: (or google translate using skills) and you find new articles before anyone else.

 

[belimom]

Wow. When searching for our previous discussion, I found this post as well. He said he last "heard from her" on 1/14. Could something be lost in the translation - Lavy, could this mean last "spoke" to her or last "heard" from her, as in e-mails, texts, everything? TIA!

How was Sarai?

She was an amazing person, love of my life and mother of my kids. We are both religious people we met while praying at the church. 2 years later we got married. She was happy and cheerful. She was studying psychology in Staten Island College. She wanted to specialize on Child Psychology. However photography was the thing made her happy the most.

Didn't you worried about her going on a long trip abroad for the first time?

I had to let her go. She really wanted to go and very insistent about it. You have to support your wife in a situation like this. She was very happy when she got her passport. She was staying in a hostel in Beyoglu. She was sending messages to her sister telling how happy she is.

How often you were talking to her when she was in Istanbul?

At the beginning we were talking on skype. I was following the photos she put on IG. But times didn't match because of the time difference. I was working when she is at the hostel. The last time I heard from her was 14th of Jan. The next day she called home and spoke to the kids, I was at work that time.

-Did she told you that she is going to Amsterdam and Munich? Did she went there to take photos too?

Yes. I don't know the people she was speaking to. Police is looking her emails to find out about people she was in contact to. They don't want me to share information in order to not to scare the suspects.

Do you think she might have fall in the hands of drug or courier mafia? Do you have such suspicions?

Sarai was good with analysing people. She would sense the people who could cause trouble and stay away from them. But it didn't happen this time...

-------

There are also 2 quotes about marriage and relationship he posted on his FB page. Do we have these somewhere? I'll try to avoid to translate something already translated.

 

[ToutCa]

Which article is this - that's so odd.

It was a direct interview with Steven Sierra in Hurriyet this morning. Lavy translated it a few pages back.

When asked, he specifically said he last talked with her on Jan. 14.

 

[KuriousKev]

:welcome5:

I do think it's interesting that they weren't following each other. He was not in the same league so to speak as Sarai when it came to photography.

Honestly, I think he was trying to save his marriage and was trying to find a common interest - such as getting involved with photography and the whole IG crowd. She had over 3000 followers, which means she was getting attention from the public for her photos. He has about 300, which is more or less your own social network (i.e., about the same amount as FB users have - hope this makes sense) and not any public acclaim for his photography.

SS attached Hasttags extensively on her photos so it's not surprising she had so many followers, the more hashtags you use, the wider audience you have. Her husband didn't seem to use as many hashtags therefore his images wouldn't reach a large audience.

I'm a heavy IG user as well for some time now and what I've found is, not surprising, when an attractive woman post an image of herself, or has an image of herself as her account thumbnail, she usually will have a lot of followers and of course they're usually men.

We don't know if there was not any previous infidelity between both parties in this relationship so I try not to paint either as faithful angels...we just don't know. I personally know a few women in relationships where the sig has strayed more than once and she still sticks around BUT uses it as her own excuse to stray.

 

[tardislass]

It was a direct interview with Steven Sierra in Hurriyet this morning. Lavy translated it a few pages back.

When asked, he specifically said he last talked with her on Jan. 14.

But did LE say she spoke with the kids and the next day to her husband? On the 20th?! Even the NY Times reported that. I think this case is getting more muddled as time goes by.

 

[ToutCa]

But did LE say she spoke with the kids and the next day to her husband? On the 20th?! Even the NY Times reported that.

Some others slightly upthread looked up the quote and it said, I think, she Skyped her kids on the 20th.

Many of us found it pretty weird that Steven said in the interview he last talked with her (or "heard from her") the 14th.

Seems to question how closely he was in touch with her or surveilling the details of the trip, at least...

 

[lavy]

Wow. When searching for our previous discussion, I found this post as well. He said he last "heard from her" on 1/14. Could something be lost in the translation - Lavy, could this mean last "spoke" to her or last "heard" from her, as in e-mails, texts, everything? TIA!

I noticed it while translating. He doesn't say I spoke to her. I wouldn't say it means he spoke to her. However this interview was done by a turkish journalist in NY. It was obviously made in english and translated to turkish. And I translated it back to english. So again I wonder if we lost the meaning along the way.

Maybe Yashim can suggest a different translation

Ben en son 14 ocak cumartesi günü kendisinden haber almıştım.

Looking at it again. It says the last time I heard from her was 14th of Jan. The next day she called home and spoke to the kids, I was at work that time.

Though he doesn't say this is the last time she spoke to the kids. So she may well have spoken to kids both on 15th and 20th.

 

[ToutCa]

I noticed it while translating. He doesn't say I spoke to her. I wouldn't say it means he spoke to her. However this interview was done by a turkish journalist in NY. It was obviously made in english and translated to turkish. And I translated it back to english. So again I wonder if we lost the meaning along the way.

Whatever the story, if he never had contact with her after the 14th, that's interesting! The reins were loose, for sure.

 

[Yashim]

Though I highly doubt SS was involved in anything illegal, the only type pf smuggling that would make such a long trip worthwhile would be "Antiquities Smuggling."

The below is from a 1996 Business Week article, yet I bet not much has change since then.

"Turks realized about that time that they could buy an ancient piece for a few thousand dollars from the farmer who found it, and sell it in New York or Munich for $500,000,"

http://www.businessweek.com/stories/1996-04-14/a-smugglers-den-of-antiquities

$500K in 1996 would be close to $750K in 2013, ie. ceteris paribus.

Source: http://www.usinflationcalculator.com/

Sorry, if we had considered this and dismissed it already.

---- edit -------

Sorry I just noticed necco had already brought it up.

 

[belimom]

But did LE say she spoke with the kids and the next day to her husband? On the 20th?! Even the NY Times reported that. I think this case is getting more muddled as time goes by.

I think it was her father she spoke with (or Skyped with) on the 20th or maybe even the 21st? I do believe she IM'ed with her sister on the morning of 1/21, saying she was going to Galata Bridge. (All of this is from past articles - IIRC).

 

[Yashim]

Ben en son 14 ocak cumartesi günü kendisinden haber almıştım.

I agree with Lavy. This translates as:

"It was on January 14th Saturday that I last heard from her."

So, it could also mean his kids might have said "Dad, mom says hi".

Yet, I tend to think he directly spoke with her, but that's my take.

 

[Sandstorm]

i agree with that but she died after she had sex with an other man ... she crossed that line .... a few men would like back their wives after cheating on them

Yannis,
We do not know that she had sex with another man. So far that has not been proven. There are conflicting reports regarding the main sexual suspect:Taylan.

Please keep in mind that the media are out to sell their stories and they frequently take bits, pieces, and weave them into profitable income.

"Sex in the bathroom of a bar" sells a lot more papers than "two cups of tea".

We should be cautious in order to be fair so that we can sift through this mystery. Sarai lost her life; may we be wise and patient as more truths are discovered and revealed in this tragedy.

 

[belimom]

Yannis,
We do not know that she had sex with another man. So far that has not been proven. There are conflicting reports regarding the main sexual suspect:Taylan.

Please keep in mind that the media are out to sell their stories and they frequently take bits, pieces, and weave them into profitable income.

"Sex in the bathroom of a bar" sells a lot more papers than "two cups of tea".

We should be cautious in order to be fair so that we can sift through this mystery. Sarai lost her life; may we be wise and patient as more truths are discovered and revealed in this tragedy.

The only two people who know what happened are Sarai and Taylan/Tarkan. Although we do not know for sure, many of the sources reporting it are considered MSM in Turkey and not just rumor tabloids. In that regards, it's legit to discuss it as a possibility if not a probability.

Sarai did lose her life - very tragically. We could just end right there but then that's not what this site is about. It's about sleuthing - and going further than just the unfortunate news that she was found deceased. Theorizing based on what is being reported in MSM does not belittle the fact that she lost her life and that two boys have lost their mother.

 

[Yashim]

We should bear in mind that anything SS's husband said is also translated into Turkish. So we don't know exactly what he said to the Turkish press.

Just checked Hurriyet's website in English. The latest article was the one below, and it doesn't say much.

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/sarai-sierra-a-passage-to-turkey.aspx?pageID=238&nID=40744&NewsCatID=469

Perhaps, we already discussed it.

 

[yannis]

hi Sandstorm i really appreciate it but if we believe nothing news say it's true then non of us should talk in here ... we are developing theories on what the news print ... otherwise we wouldn't have any information , right ?