GUILTY Turkey - Sarai Sierra, 33, NY woman murdered, Istanbul, 21 Jan 2013 - #1

[Orgona]

This might be crazy, but maybe she got involved with smuggling something? Jewelry or art or documents, she's a photographer? Might be silly to consider it as a cloak and dagger type of thing but if she was paid to do it, she might have felt like it was worth it to get the trip for free.



Apparently Amsterdam has very lax drug laws.

http://www.amsterdam.info/drugs/

It's a possibility IMO, but maybe she just thought she was just travelling with a tour guide(if she in fact wasn't flying alone to Amsterdam) and could have no idea she was used in some way to smuggle something or even just to give an impression on the border of a normal friends going somewhere together.
JMHO

 

[stmarysmead]

"Sierra’s husband, Steven Sierra, gave police forces her Facebook and Twitter correspondence with the four Turks in attempts to track her activities during her time in the city. Police found online chat transcriptions that took place between Sierra and a man called Taylan, showing the two arranging a meeting by Galata Tower on Jan. 20. "

"Footage of Sierra walking around in Sultanahmet and Taksim surfaced yesterday and police forces have been tracking the stores Sierra visited. Sierra’s room in a Tarlabaşı house reportedly cost her 222 euros, and her expenses through her holidays in Turkey, the Netherlands and Germany totaled over $10,000. "

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/mi...lice-.aspx?pageID=238&nID=40175&NewsCatID=341


This was an expensive trip. Yet she seems to have stayed in an inexpensive place, eaten at the mall. I wonder where she stayed in Munich.

I wonder why the family waited until the 25th to contact police after she failed to come home on the 22nd?

 

[lucky181]

I thought she was staying in the yellow house but it is next door to that one. This is a blog by a young foreign woman who has been living across the street for 6 months and it includes pictures.

http://www.justonewayticket.com/2013/01/29/where-is-sarai-sierra/

Now that I look at the blog pictures, I think they are standing outside the steps that lead downstairs to the basement apt in the yellow house. The pictures made me think they were gathered in front of the neighboring house.

 

[stmarysmead]

Actually, if I've done the conversion right, the room in Turkey cost almost $300 a night. So she spent $1500 for five nights she was not even there.

So lets say $3000 for 10 nights. There's another $7000 to account for.

just checked...You can stay at the Ritz Carlton in Istanbul for $215 euro a night.

 

[SeaEclipse]

You know, I'm one of the less suspicious (of her itinerary) posters at the moment, but that even strikes me as a wee bit odd. It would make sense if there was something or someone specific in Munich she wanted to see, a friend who lived there or a building/site she specifically wanted to visit. And maybe a layover in Amsterdam was necessary (KLM hub), and she extended the layover so she could see the sites as long as she was touching down there? But then why so much contact with the "Amsterdam tour guide" if she was only going to be there less than a day?

She did post a comment under one of her pictures "....Amsterdam was amazing in every way.the Cafes were epic lol...." And she had several shots of Amsterdam, a hotel, the train station, etc.

I didn't see any IG shots of Munich, and in her comments she didn't mention Munich - she just said she was in Amsterdam and would be returning to Istanbul.

The bit about the cafes being "epic" (especially followed by lol) implies to me that she went to Amsterdam to smoke pot. Cafe type establishments where you can get pot are actually called "coffee shops" in Amsterdam ("brown cafes" are more like UK pubs), but I'm not sure she would have known that offhand / the overall tenor of the comment suggests something quasi-illicit to me.

 

[ami]

Actually, if I've done the conversion right, the room in Turkey cost almost $300 a night. So she spent $1500 for five nights she was not even there.

So lets say $3000 for 10 nights. There's another $7000 to account for.

just checked...You can stay at the Ritz Carlton in Istanbul for $215 euro a night.

I think she spent 222 Euros for the entire 13 day stay - which would be ~$300 US, which would be ~$23 a night for the basement apartment. This makes sense. Much nicer apartments either in the same building or adjacent building were being advertised on airbnb for $35 a night.

eta: incidentally, I don't think the $10,000 is accurate. I don't know where they got that number but it doesn't make sense. It also doesn't sound like a direct quote from the husband or brother, whose statements tend to be reported verbatim.

 

[fringles]

$10,000 would be a staggering amount of money to spend on a three week trip - and ami I agree, I think it's $300 for the whole stay, not per night - you could stay somewhere crazy fancy in Istanbul for $300 per night.

 

[fringles]

This might be crazy, but maybe she got involved with smuggling something? Jewelry or art or documents, she's a photographer? Might be silly to consider it as a cloak and dagger type of thing but if she was paid to do it, she might have felt like it was worth it to get the trip for free.



Apparently Amsterdam has very lax drug laws.

http://www.amsterdam.info/drugs/

Of course it's possible, as anything is possible, but to be honest and this is very much IMO but I pretty much never believe those stories about people randomly ending up smuggling drugs without realising, or falling in with drug smugglers by accident. I just always feel that drug smugglers are more organised than to be taking their chances on unknown strangers. Also, within Europe there are no border crossing stations, so if you wanted to take drugs or any illegal cargo from Amsterdam to Munich, you would drive them - far, far easier to get away with than putting someone on a plane.

 

[frenchvixen]

"Sierra’s husband, Steven Sierra, gave police forces her Facebook and Twitter correspondence with the four Turks in attempts to track her activities during her time in the city. Police found online chat transcriptions that took place between Sierra and a man called Taylan, showing the two arranging a meeting by Galata Tower on Jan. 20. "

"Footage of Sierra walking around in Sultanahmet and Taksim surfaced yesterday and police forces have been tracking the stores Sierra visited. Sierra’s room in a Tarlabaşı house reportedly cost her 222 euros, and her expenses through her holidays in Turkey, the Netherlands and Germany totaled over $10,000. "

http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/mi...lice-.aspx?pageID=238&nID=40175&NewsCatID=341


This was an expensive trip. Yet she seems to have stayed in an inexpensive place, eaten at the mall. I wonder where she stayed in Munich.

I wonder why the family waited until the 25th to contact police after she failed to come home on the 22nd?

I'm curious as to why this trip cost so much? In January, airplane tickets are pretty inexpensive. I just returned from Stockholm last monday and the flight cost for three airline tix were under 3k. Hotel and airline expenses are usually the most expensive part of a trip. Another thing that bothers me is that her sister said she spoke to her on the 21st, the day of her return, yet the apartment owner said he last he saw her was the day before. If you are living in such close quarters with someone how could they not see you for an entire day (the time difference overseas would mean that it would be at least 1p? I have used airbnb before to stay at apartments however I refuse to do a "share" situation and will most definately not do it with someone of the opposite sex.

 

[Dion]

Did Sarai pay for the side trip herself (either by cash or credit card) and was it planned ahead of time?

It appears as if she was doing the trip on the cheap. I don’t know how much she paid for the flight, but she went to Turkey in the off season (people are wearing hats and jackets), so it was probably less expensive, and her accommodation only cost $100 a week.

If the $10,000 total trip cost is accurate, then it is totally out of whack for an inexpensive trip. If Sarai had that amount of money, she would probably have loaned some to her friend so she would have a travel companion in Turkey.

 

[ami]

Did Sarai pay for the side trip herself (either by cash or credit card) and was it planned ahead of time?

It appears as if she was doing the trip on the cheap. I don’t know how much she paid for the flight, but she went to Turkey in the off season (people are wearing hats and jackets), so it was probably less expensive, and her accommodation only cost $100 a week.

If the $10,000 total trip cost is accurate, then it is totally out of whack for an inexpensive trip. If Sarai had that amount of money, she would probably have loaned some to her friend so she would have a travel companion in Turkey.

The $10,000 figure sounds to me like something someone who really didn't know wildly pulled out of their *** when asked to speculate on what a trip like this "might cost" - as if they were saying "some large number of dollars"

 

[Dion]

(snipped)
This was an expensive trip. Yet she seems to have stayed in an inexpensive place, eaten at the mall. I wonder where she stayed in Munich.

I wonder why the family waited until the 25th to contact police after she failed to come home on the 22nd?

I believe that the 25th was the date she originally booked to come home, but decided to cut her trip short because she missed her kids. So her family may just have thought possibly that she was sticking to her original plan.

This change of flight plans raises questions, because it is not usually cheap to just change flights - was there some other reason she wanted to go home early, and did she in fact change her flight plans.

 

[ami]

I believe that the 25th was the date she originally booked to come home, but decided to cut her trip short because she missed her kids. So her family may just have thought possibly that she was sticking to her original plan.

This change of flight plans raises questions, because it is not usually cheap to just change flights - was there some other reason she wanted to go home early, and did she in fact change her flight plans.

Yes, the earlier articles explained that she is a part time student at a local NY university and she had to come back to settle some schedule or class snafu.

 

[radiator]

I think she spent 222 Euros for the entire 13 day stay - which would be ~$300 US, which would be ~$23 a night for the basement apartment. This makes sense. Much nicer apartments either in the same building or adjacent building were being advertised on airbnb for $35 a night.

eta: incidentally, I don't think the $10,000 is accurate. I don't know where they got that number but it doesn't make sense. It also doesn't sound like a direct quote from the husband or brother, whose statements tend to be reported verbatim.

I totally agree. I rented a very large 2 bedroom apartment not too far from this one (and much, much nicer) in october for about $70 a night.

the only way I can see her spending $10,000 is if she was making expensive purchases like carpets. food, lodging and transportation are all very cheap in turkey.

 

[radiator]

I thought she was staying in the yellow house but it is next door to that one. This is a blog by a young foreign woman who has been living across the street for 6 months and it includes pictures.

http://www.justonewayticket.com/2013/01/29/where-is-sarai-sierra/

shoot, she seems to have taken down that post. one of the newspaper articles specifically said it was the yellow house but perhaps they were wrong.

 

[Dion]

What does seem odd is going to amsterdam then straight on to Munich that day- its about 3.5 hours flying from Istanbul to Amsterdam and if she was flying on to Munich later in the day then that makes for a busy day of travelling, with not much time for sightseeing in Amsterdam, so IMO it makes the Amsterdam trip make not a huge amount of sense. I can't see a sleeper train (overnight) to Munich from Amsterdam so she either flew or caught a day train (seven hours or so).

Also, while there are lots of good reasons to go to Amsterdam, Munich isn't quite as exciting. It's not a bad city but I wouldn't think you'd go there unless you had a specific reason. It is the nearest major city to the site of Dachau, which is, I think, the easiest concentration camp site to visit, so I did wonder if she was wanting to go there.

A travel agent could have taken such a route in order to check out hotels for business, and would get free accommodation, and possibly a free or heavily discounted flight. Sarai could have tagged along as a travelling companion. I hope major hotels in these 2 cities are being asked to see if someone checked in matching Sarai's description.

I feel if she took this side trip alone, she would have stayed at inexpensive accommodations, but as mentioned, why even go there for the short time and expense involved.

 

[Yellow]

Yes what seems odd to me is the length of her trips to Amsterdam and Munich, it seems pretty far to go for basically only a day at most in Amsterdam. Munich too strikes me as odd to go to after Amsterdam. Most people go there are a jumping off point for the Bavaraian Alps, Salzburg, Castle neuwenstein, etc. there is not much to see in the city itself, most of the cool stuff are day trips outside the city.

So it would be interesting if her pics of Munich show her in the Alps. If not, I think that would be odd, bc that is the main reason why people go to Munich.

Media is reporting that they are looking into someone she corresponded with on social media. I wonder if they had anything to do w her going to those European cities.

I wonder if airline security would have pics of her in the airport in turkey, Amsterdam and Munich. Maybe they would see her w someone? There has to be cameras all over the airport, though hopefully they do not erase stuff...

 

[radiator]

A travel agent could have taken such a route in order to check out hotels for business, and would get free accommodation, and possibly a free or heavily discounted flight. Sarai could have tagged along as a travelling companion. I hope major hotels in these 2 cities are being asked to see if someone checked in matching Sarai's description.

I feel if she took this side trip alone, she would have stayed at inexpensive accommodations, but as mentioned, why even go there for the short time and expense involved.

that's an interesting idea. it seems though that if she did take the trip with somebody else she didn't mention the other person to her family or friends.

 

[ami]

shoot, she seems to have taken down that post. one of the newspaper articles specifically said it was the yellow house but perhaps they were wrong.

I think it is the yellow house. Look at this pic and where the basement door is positioned:

http://assets.nydailynews.com/polop...erivatives/landscape_635/missing31n-1-web.jpg

 

[frenchvixen]

I don't know why but I feel that SS is alive and is somehow running away. Why would she disappear on the day of her departure? If she did indeed have a $10k budget could she have used the money for a long term apartment and decided to "runaway" instead. She knows that she can be tracked with her phone and ipad (although 3G does not work internationally) so she left them at the original apartment. She probably did not think that all this attention would be put on a Latino girl (I think her IG friends have contacted the press and are keeping the spotlight on her but normally a Latina girl going missing does not get this much attention).

The other scenario is someone in the apartment has her or has hurt her (I have a feeling that she is fine though).

The timing of her disappearance is too coincidental.

I must say that her short trips to Amsterdam and Munich are very strange. I thought it was ok at first but when I found out about the one day stay it didn't sit right with me. It could also be that she didn't stay for one day b/c she didn't want to spend money on hotel. I remember Amsterdam hotels costing about 100 Euros per night or more (this would be almost half of what she paid for her total accommodation in Turkey). Plane tickets are very cheap on eurojet or ryanair so that would not have been an issue but she may have not wanted to spend her money on hotel.