David Knezevic, accused of kidnapping his estranged wife while she was in Spain, denies any involvement, according to his attorney. Knezevic is suspected of leaving Ana Maria Knezevic's apartment building with what appeared to be a suitcase on the evening she disappeared in February, federal court documents allege.
David Knezevic, the estranged husband of Ana Maria Knezevic, has denied any involvement in her disappearance from a Madrid apartment building, according to his attorney Ken Padowitz.
Federal court documents allege that David Knezevic, 36, left Ana's apartment building on the evening of February 2 with what appeared to be a suitcase. Security cameras recorded a man resembling Knezevic wearing a motorcycle helmet and carrying a can of spray paint, which he used to disable a surveillance camera.
Ana Maria Knezevic, 40, was last seen entering her Madrid apartment building around 2:20 p.m. on February 2. She was reported missing soon after when she failed to appear for a planned trip to Barcelona.
David Knezevic was arrested on Monday at Miami International Airport in connection with his wife's disappearance. Padowitz said he was not making any statements at the time of publication.
According to Sanna Rameau, Ana's friend from Florida, Ana sent her a strange text message on February 3, claiming she had met someone wonderful and was going to spend a few days at their summer house. The message was unusual, making Rameau believe that Ana may have been taken against her will.
The FBI learned that a Colombian woman who met David on a dating app received a similar text message from him on February 3, asking her to translate the same sentences Ana sent to Rameau. The Colombian woman later discovered that the messages matched an article about Ana's disappearance.
Law enforcement determined that David had rented a vehicle in Serbia in January and drove it to Spain, returning in March. The rental car agency reported that the windows had been tinted, the license plate frames had changed, and two stickers had been removed from the vehicle when it was returned.
The new license plates had been stolen from the same street where Ana's apartment building is located.
Spanish law enforcement also identified the brand of spray paint allegedly used by David to black out the security cameras in Ana's building and obtained footage of a man resembling Knezevic purchasing it from a store in Madrid.
In March, a woman claiming to be Ana called an insurance carrier to cancel her policies, while one of David's employees admitted to impersonating Ana to open a new bank account in her name using her Social Security number at David's request.
David and Ana Knezevic had been married for 13 years before deciding to separate last summer. Rameau described them as a "successful couple" who owned an IT company and real estate in South Florida.
Law enforcement alleges that David did not want to split assets evenly with Ana in their contentious divorce.
