On Sunday, January 3, a Ukrainian interpreter has been found dead with her hands cuffed behind her back and a plastic bag over her head at her apartment in Turkey.
Kristina Novitskaya, 30, was discovered at her home in the Bodrum resort on the Aegean coast on Saturday. She had died a few days earlier. The front door was locked with the key inside, the windows were also secured from the inside and there was no trace of any struggle. Local police say the mainline inquiry is a suicide, but her friends say that 'life-loving' and 'cheerful' Ms. Novitskaya would not have ended her own life. However, the investigation is now considering two versions of the tragedy: suicide and premeditated murder.
Chrystyna Novytska lived alone in a cottage village in the area of Eskisešme near Bodrum, where celebrities like to rest in the summer. According to Milliyet, she has long suffered from severe headaches and went to Ukraine for treatment. The woman was from Kyiv, which is indicated on her Facebook page. She worked as a model, interpreter and dance instructor in Turkey.
Chrystyna has always been in touch with her mother but did not contact her since December 30. Therefore, on January 30 her mom asked the neighbors to check up on her daughter and whether everything is okay.
When the owner of the house found the girl dead in the house, which she rented. The men had to get inside with the help of a locksmith, as everything was locked. He called the police and medics immediately. The doctors only confirmed Christina's death. The girl's body was sent to the morgue of the Mugla Institute of Forensic Medicine to determine the exact cause of her death. Her mother, who works as a real estate agent in Ukraine, came to Turkey to pick up her daughter's body for burial in her homeland.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine confirmed the information about the death of Ukrainian citizen Khrystyna Novytska in Turkey. According to the press secretary of the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry Oleh Nikolenko, the case is under the special control of the Ukrainian consulate in Antalya.
"Diplomats have already established contacts with relatives of the deceased and Turkish law enforcement agencies investigating," he said.
The preliminary investigations indicate that suicide could have caused the young woman’s untimely death as windows were closed, and the door was locked with the key on the inside. In addition, ropes, charcoal, and a scarf were also found at the scene but no cause of death has been announced so far. That was an initial version of the Turkish police.
Ramazan Ashkin, the guard of the villa, said that Khrystyna Novytska had rented the villa for 6 months, he last saw her on December 30. The girl was nicely dressed, without any signs that she was a victim of violence - there were no bruises on her face. Turkish police reported that CCTV cameras showed no visits since a food delivery on 31 December. Her body was found on Saturday.
Novitskaya's neighbor was a famous Turkish actor and TV presenter Alp Kirsan (he has an apartment in the same cottage town), who wrote about the tragedy with a Ukrainian woman on his social media. The actor accompanied his tweet with the hashtag #KadinaSiddet - "no violence against women". According to another version of the investigation, the girl could have been killed by her boyfriend.
On Monday, January 4, Turkish media published the data released by police that Chrystyna Novitskaya ordered handcuffs online 4 days before her death. In addition, acquaintances of the girl claim that she was influenced by the film "Between Death and Life" (2003).
"Instead of sealing her mouth with a duct tape, like in the movie, Novitskaya covered it with a piece of cloth she found in the house. It was found that the young woman could have tried to commit suicide with a rope she made from a plastic bag," the Milliyet publication reported.
The friends dismissed the reports of the Turkish police as 'strange' and even believe that local law enforcement officers may be "covering up for someone important", as per Obozrevatel.