GUILTY Turkey - Sarai Sierra, 33, NY woman murdered, Istanbul, 21 Jan 2013 - #5

[Herat]

I remember reading early on, probably when she was reported missing, but her body had not yet been discovered, that she was thought to have been near an area that was notorious for vagrants, druggies, and huffers. In one of the videos of the intact walls, taken much farther down by an English guy at least a year before SS ever visited, he mentions being warned about not going anywhere into the walls.

How was it that she would have not heard these warnings?

 

[zarra30]

Just to counter the above comments, I have travelled all over Turkey, often alone, even to the extremely scary South East full of terrifying village rural types. I also don't consider myself lucky to not have been raped or attacked.

I just wanted to answer something that was addressed a few pages back. Someone asked if there was somewhere that Sarai may have been heading on her walk down Kennedy. Actually, yes there is and it's a walk I've done myself several times. If you keep walking, eventually you get to an arch in the walls, go through it to the right and you are in an area called Kumkapi. There are cobbled streets and fish restaurants/bars there. It's a nice area and popular with tourists.

Thank you. So maybe she was headed to Kumkapi? Or maybe she actually did go there or somewhere else nearby off Kennedy and stayed and shopped or roamed around and was headed back and got followed as she walked back?

On the map SR posted, it looks like a train is near there. Or the symbol could be a bus? Could she have been waiting for a train or a bus or subway from that area back to her neighborhood and Z or someone else came up from behind? Just guesses.

I googled "went to Kumkapi" and came across lots of great tourist remarks,a photographer who took several artisticpictures of the area and also a daily blog of an American woman who spent an entire summer in Istanbul in 2012. She apparently loved it, and described in detail her walks and the people she met. She posted pics and traveled all over Istanbul and other areas in Turkey. She was sometimes with other people she met at her hostel but other times she walked alone, and seemed to feel pretty safe. The one 'iffy' situation she seemed to encounter was when she was in an area of an aquaduct and a homeless man approached her and said 'hello' which seemed to her to be the only word he knew in English, but she walked back to a mosque near the area.

Alpmighty, so glad you're back! And CMac2!

 

[CMac2]

There are not so many odd coincidences, once you count out the unconfirmed tabloid "reportings" of "criminal element" encounters, stalking carpet hustlers, contradictory crime scene details and bathroom hanky-panky.

We need to go back to square one, in a way. Sarai died doing what she had set out to do, taking photographs. With just a little bit more luck she would now be alive and home. And that means, yes, with a bit more bad luck anyone of us could have become a random victim somewhere (women always more in danger, unfortunately).

This crime had less to do with her activities than with the dangers all of us face when we go out into the unknown. When travelling solo, you need to know what you're doing and we can't know that all of the time. Sure, Sarai clearly was on the reckless side, so there's some reason why it didn't happen to us. But it doesn't take us far. It also doesn't help to paint her as an imbecile now that "drug mule", "sex tourist", "CIA" etc. seem to have gone out the window. "9-going-on-33", as one description of her goes, has some truth to it, but doesn't define her completely (how about raising two kids?).

I wasn't even including any of the nonsense about the "criminal element" and bathroom sex. I was actually speaking to the decision to come to Istanbul, then Amsterdam to crash on a random internet stranger's couch, meeting people in person whom she'd had no previous contact with other than online communications- and therefore no ability to vet them properly. Most of all, I was referring to the circumstances involve Taylan and the day she actually disappeared.

Bless her heart, but to be honest, she made a lot of naive errors in judgment on this trip. That it was none of those things that led to her death, and was instead at the hands of some random trash-collecting stranger is bizarre.

I DO believe Z killed her, and I DO believe her death was at the hands of a random stranger. I just find it so weird that THIS is who killed her, and not any of the other nameless strangers she was spending time with. She was killed doing one of the only things she chose to do on this entire trip that SHOULD have been safe- sightseeing.

 

[Herat]

I think any of us would have suffered the same fate had we been where SS was when she encountered Z.

However, I am quite certain that none of us would have been in that place. What she was doing was not ordinary sightseeing that most of us or other tourists would do ALONE.

She was doing something that was not in the pervue of ordinary sightseeing.

There is a video made by some tourists posted on this board many pages back. The family of three- husband, wife, and full-sized teenage son are farther down the walls and do some scrambling around and climbing on them. The woman narrates about how she doesn't like being there, it's a bad neighborhood and they shouldn't be in this place.

SS was in a much more isolated and creepy place. And she wasn't with two other men of adult size to protect her.

I think it's totally in keeping with the risks she took out of naivete' or whatever you want to call it.

 

[pbj]

Does anyone know, did T. have a car? Could he have been meeting SS on Kennedy since easier to get to. If no car, were there bus stops there?

Would hope if T was meeting her there , he at least said be on the other side of the road.

The 9 going on 32, I think referred to her being so trusting and naive, which is played out by her many choices on this trip. I know exactly what you're saying CMac 2, there were so many things that made us conclude it was not random.

If T. said let's meet at the walls, he was guilty in placing her in such danger.

 

[alabaster]

I wasn't even including any of the nonsense about the "criminal element" and bathroom sex. I was actually speaking to the decision to come to Istanbul, then Amsterdam to crash on a random internet stranger's couch, meeting people in person whom she'd had no previous contact with other than online communications- and therefore no ability to vet them properly. Most of all, I was referring to the circumstances involve Taylan and the day she actually disappeared.

Bless her heart, but to be honest, she made a lot of naive errors in judgment on this trip. That it was none of those things that led to her death, and was instead at the hands of some random trash-collecting stranger is bizarre.

I DO believe Z killed her, and I DO believe her death was at the hands of a random stranger. I just find it so weird that THIS is who killed her, and not any of the other nameless strangers she was spending time with. She was killed doing one of the only things she chose to do on this entire trip that SHOULD have been safe- sightseeing.

I'm sorry Cmac2, I didn't mean to say that you yourself were going for all the tabloid made-up 'traces'. I was quoting you because of your question abourt what this means for our sense of safety.

 

[StCirq]

Interesting article here:

http://lareviewofbooks.org/article.php?id=1436&fulltext=1#.USjejOZkebk.twitter

First I've heard of the IG "5shotchallenge."

 

[alpmighty]

Does anyone know, did T. have a car? Could he have been meeting SS on Kennedy since easier to get to. If no car, were there bus stops there?

Would hope if T was meeting her there , he at least said be on the other side of the road.

The 9 going on 32, I think referred to her being so trusting and naive, which is played out by her many choices on this trip. I know exactly what you're saying CMac 2, there were so many things that made us conclude it was not random.

If T. said let's meet at the walls, he was guilty in placing her in such danger.

It's highly unlikely that Ziya would have a car, considering he was homeless. You can't buy a 800$ el cheapo car in Turkey.

 

[delal]

Not Z, T. Even if he had a car I doubt he'd be using it around there. There are some buses that run along Kennedy I believe but not many bus stops in that area IIRC.

 

[zarra30]

Alp or Delal,
I keep thinking she was FOUND in that cave area, but that doesn't necessarily mean she was wandering around in said cave area, in my opinion.

Do you think she could have been lost or on her way to a train or bus or ferry near the area and got surprised by Z or someone else? Would those areas be crowded? I know some train/bus/subway stops in NYC are in isolated places.

It was reported at one time that she was walking briskly. She seemed to be dressed well. Perhaps she was going to a place to meet others, or to buy souvenirs, or to eat or take some pics though as others have said, she took (or uploaded) so few.
It's just me, but I cannot see her going into a creepy area that others mentioned were warned against. This was her last day. Wouldn't one of her friends, by then, have warned her about the walls and dangerous places? Especially as she was a tourist and a woman?

Sigh...I guess anything and everything is possible

 

[SANDOVAL]

Interesting article here:

http://lareviewofbooks.org/article.php?id=1436&fulltext=1#.USjejOZkebk.twitter

First I've heard of the IG "5shotchallenge."

'She was taking part in a “#5shotchallenge” designed to “take us out of our comfort zone.” On her Instagram page she had listed rules of this challenge some days prior to her disappearance. “IGer must post 5 pics within 5 days with no posting in between and no reposts,” she wrote.'
I'm assuming that she was simply taking part in it, and had not been the one to set it up....(?)
Someone did post a photo of railroad lines which they said was part of 'a challenge'', and that SS had joked that next time she would try to get 'under' the rails'.
PS. Apparently it's a tag game.
http://amptcommunity.com/forum/topics/5-shot-challenge
This is link
(i think i recall the challenge was 'low' shots)

 

[SANDOVAL]

Alp,
I keep thinking she was FOUND in that cave area, but that doesn't necessarily mean she was wandering around in said cave area, in my opinion.

Do you think she could have been lost or on her way to a train or bus or ferry near the area and got surprised by Z or someone else? Would those areas be crowded? I know some train/bus/subway stops in NYC are in isolated places.

I think it was said that SS had been dragged 100 meters from the attack spot, and at around 300 ft. that's a long way.....

 

[delal]

Alp or Delal,
I keep thinking she was FOUND in that cave area, but that doesn't necessarily mean she was wandering around in said cave area, in my opinion.

Do you think she could have been lost or on her way to a train or bus or ferry near the area and got surprised by Z or someone else? Would those areas be crowded? I know some train/bus/subway stops in NYC are in isolated places.

It was reported at one time that she was walking briskly. She seemed to be dressed well. Perhaps she was going to a place to meet others, or to buy souvenirs, or to eat or take some pics though as others have said, she took (or uploaded) so few.
It's just me, but I cannot see her going into a creepy area that others mentioned were warned against. This was her last day. Wouldn't one of her friends, by then, have warned her about the walls and dangerous places? Especially as she was a tourist and a woman?

I don't think she was lost as there's only one way to go on that road really. If she were lost she could have just turned around and gone back the way she had come.

Bus stops would be along the main road so not anywhere isolated.

Not sure whether her "friends" (sadly, we haven't seen much evidence of these Turkish friends) would have specifically warned her about areas unless she had asked about them. People in Istanbul are proud of their city and prefer to recommend great places to visit rather than warn about places not to visit. Same as anywhere really.

There are some statues of pasas (I think) from Ottoman times on the wall side of the road.

 

[Rochelle]

Sorry - new here! - I was replying to someone's post that said - "The 9 going on 32, I think referred to her being so trusting and naive, which is played out by her many choices on this trip."

The "9 going on 32" was actually how one of her pastors described her when she was a young girl:

"But the passion and curiosity and spirituality and adventuresome spark that propelled her had been manifest since she was a little girl.

While other youngsters played, little Sarai had joined the adults in handing out sandwiches and ladling soup at the food for the poor program at Christian Pentecostal Church.

“A young girl that always had a compassionate heart,” says another pastor, Martin Tursi. “Nine years old going on 29 years old.”
the article is here:

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articl...-in-istanbul-was-an-artist-in-the-making.html

 

[Blackydress]

Alp or Delal,
I keep thinking she was FOUND in that cave area, but that doesn't necessarily mean she was wandering around in said cave area, in my opinion.

Do you think she could have been lost or on her way to a train or bus or ferry near the area and got surprised by Z or someone else? Would those areas be crowded? I know some train/bus/subway stops in NYC are in isolated places.

It was reported at one time that she was walking briskly. She seemed to be dressed well. Perhaps she was going to a place to meet others, or to buy souvenirs, or to eat or take some pics though as others have said, she took (or uploaded) so few.
It's just me, but I cannot see her going into a creepy area that others mentioned were warned against. This was her last day. Wouldn't one of her friends, by then, have warned her about the walls and dangerous places? Especially as she was a tourist and a woman?

Sigh...I guess anything and everything is possible

No, all the bus stops are located by Kennedy Ave. or by the seaside. Nearest train station is Cankurtaran and if she was going there, she would not be walking to the historic walls. She would have to keep walking on Kennedy and climb a steep road. This station has nothing to do with the area she was found.
This is an area not anyone would go normally pictures or no pictures. It is not a touristic place like Sultanahmet, there are no signs or anything you would normally see in a touristic area. No tourist or a Turkish person would want to go there normally. Train just goes past so does the traffic.

 

[pbj]

Thanks Rochelle, that's what happens when you don't look up your sources and then go from memory. I did remember the quote as being 9 going on twenty-something...and then I thought that's not right, I think she was 31 or 32...but didn't look it up. Thanks for doing so.

 

[Blackydress]

This case is so confusing. Even the reporters following it are confused. All news is either wrong, exaggerated or just made up. If Z. called his brother on the 9th and told him he would pass to Syria, maybe he is gone already considering the time which passed.

 

[zarra30]

I don't think she was lost as there's only one way to go on that road really. If she were lost she could have just turned around and gone back the way she had come.

Bus stops would be along the main road so not anywhere isolated.

Not sure whether her "friends" (sadly, we haven't seen much evidence of these Turkish friends) would have specifically warned her about areas unless she had asked about them. People in Istanbul are proud of their city and prefer to recommend great places to visit rather than warn about places not to visit. Same as anywhere really.

Thanks, so the 'lost' seems not a real option in such a straight course.

True, we haven't heard much about her Turkish friends, in fact who knows if the other IGers were even Turkish, or if she had met other International people once she got there.

I differ slightly in the warning thing, though. I've had of out-of towners visit me and I will suggest areas and sights in the city to go, but, especially in the case of a lone woman friend who doesn't know the city, if I (or my friends) could not accompany her, I would point out areas not safe (in my opinion) and also the best means of transportation.
Not saying they've listened to me.

 

[Rochelle]

Thanks Rochelle, that's what happens when you don't look up your sources and then go from memory. I did remember the quote as being 9 going on twenty-something...and then I thought that's not right, I think she was 31 or 32...but didn't look it up. Thanks for doing so.

Hi! It wasn't so much the 9 going on whatever age(!) - even I said 32!
Please don't think I was "nit-picking" at 29 vs. 32.
I posted the article because it seemed that some people thought that description referred to her as a grown woman - naive, child-like..........but actually it sounds like she was an "old soul" at 9 - showing compassion while other kids were playing.

 

[alpmighty]

Not Z, T. Even if he had a car I doubt he'd be using it around there. There are some buses that run along Kennedy I believe but not many bus stops in that area IIRC.

My apologies, while catching up with the thread pages I've missed during my absence, I mistakenly related your question to Ziya. Taylan might have a car. However, car usage would almost certainly be noticeable, as surveillance camera coverage around the roads in Istanbul is extensive.