Poland Poland - Iwona Wieczorek missing since July 2010

[Lwieckowicz]

19-year-old Iwona Wieczorek went missing on the night of July 16-17 in 2010. She spent a night out partying in a Sopot nightclub. She met up with her friend group consisting of her friend Adria and three male friends – Paweł, Marek and Adrian. Before visiting the club, the girl and her friends went to Paweł's grandmother's allotment garden at Reja street in Sopot. They drank alcohol there. After midnight, the whole group went to Crooked House in Sopot, where the Dream Club was located (it closed in 2019). There was an argument in the club between Iwona and one of her friends, she even briefly left the club, but came back. Then, at 3 am Iwona left the Club and decided to go home alone by walking. After leaving the party, around 4 o’clock, after a text message exchange between her and Adria Iwona's phone battery died. She never reached her home. The route to her home was along a seafront promenade between cities of Sopot and Gdansk Jelitkowo.
The last time she has been seen by city monitor camera in Gdansk-Jelitkowo by the 63rd beach entrance at 4:12AM. Iwona Wieczorek was followed by a tall, blond man. From this place, Iwona Wieczorek had about 2 km (1.2 miles) to walk home. To get there, she had to walk through a forest-park area called Ronald Reagan Park on Piastowska St. in Gdańsk and it’s here that the trace of the girl broke off.
The released surveillance footage shows a man with a towel walking behind Iwona Wieczorek on the night of her disappearance. He was recorded by surveillance cameras as he followed the missing woman for almost the entire route.

Two suspects were finally detained in December 2022, 12 years after her disappearance. The men are being called acquaintances of Iwona by the name of Paweł P. and an unnamed accomplice. Investigators had previously been to Paweł’s home several times, as well as to the flats of his relatives. I have not found any announcements of an arrest directly related to Iwona’s disappearance but for now, at least one of the men was charged with tampering with evidence, due to the fact that he is said to enter Iwona's personal computer and erase some data and contacting some people while impersonating Iwona's mother. He was also, together with his partner, charged with an unrelated drug charge.

Iwona Wieczorek was 19-years-old at the time of her disappearance with blonde long hair, brown eyes, she is around 140 pounds of weight and 5'4" tall. At the time of disappearance she wore navy mini skirt (pencil shape), and shirt with blue and white strips, blue-open toe-high heels shoes. Despite extensive use of dive teams and ground searches, to this day Iwona’s remains have not been recovered.

Two suspects arrested in the case of Iwona Wieczorek’s disappearance - PolandDaily24.com

There are the first arrests in the investigation into the mysterious disappearance of Iwona Wieczorek 12 years ago, RMF24 reported on Wednesday. In Gdansk, on the recommendation of the Malopolska Department of the National Prosecutor's Office, police officers have caught Paweł P., an...

polanddaily24.com

 

[Lwieckowicz]

Main Theories & Suspects:

– Most of the public attention around the case was focused on A Guy With A Towel (Towel for short), seen on the last CCTV footage of Iwona walking behind her. Despite numerous attempts and calls to the public, he was never identified. In 2022, the police published another video said to present the same man, in a more direct view and in better quality. Then, few days later, he went to the police himself. He turned out to be some vacationing person from Silesia, and said that he wasn't aware of the previous calls. For now, he was cleared of suspicions and was set free.

– The arrest made in connection with the case was Paweł, one of the men she partied with. Until that point, he wasn't openly considered a suspect, and even complained to the media few months ago that the police is harassing him despite his cooperation in the investigation.

– One of the most prevalent theories is that Patryk, Iwona's former boyfriend, is responsible. They broke up not so long before she went missing, and at least part of her somewhat sour mood throughout the evening is said to be connected to the fact that he was seen with another girl at another party happening in a different part of Tri-City, close to Iwona's home. By most accounts, despite not being together when Iwona went missing, they were clearly emotionally involved, and one of the theories to why she decided to walk home was that she was hoping to run into him on her way. Patryk was clearly the main suspect for Janusz Szostak in his two books, and his testimonies have a lot of inconsistencies. As for now, he wasn't charged with anything.

– A fully random crime of opportunity. Iwona was at least a little bit under the influence, walking back home barefoot with her heels in her hand, throughout a promenade filled to the brim with clubs, next to some darker areas and parks, in a hot weekend summer night. CCTV footage clearly shows that the streets were full, but this doesn't elevate the possibility that something like that could just happened. Main critique of this line of thinking is that even if Iwona met ill fate, it is unlikely that someone disposed her body and belongings in a way that have made it virtually impossible to find any trace despite numerous searches of the extended area. Note: as said before, the promenade is located next to the beach and the sea, but the Tri–City lies by a bay, and it is unlikely that if she drowned, or was thrown into the sea, her remains disappeared without ever resurfacing and dive teams searched all nearby bodies of water extensively.

 

[Lwieckowicz]

This was her route from the nightclub to the park she was last seen in. The walk is long, but it’s not unusual when I lived in Poland I would walk a great distance to and from the bars I frequented.

 

[Moonchild90]

This is great. Thank you for bringing this case up. I remember it well because I used to live in Poland at that time.

 

[Lwieckowicz]

This is great. Thank you for bringing this case up. I remember it well because I used to live in Poland at that time.

I just saw the update of the possible arrests in her case and I realized she didn’t have a thread here on WS. I hope this means the police are closer to bringing her family some closure hopefully they can find her remains and lay her to rest properly.

 

[Moonchild90]

I just saw the update of the possible arrests in her case and I realized she didn’t have a thread here on WS. I hope this means the police are closer to bringing her family some closure hopefully they can find her remains and lay her to rest properly.

I hope so too!