FBI lays out detailed case against Florida man accused in wife’s disappearance in Spain
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. — The FBI has laid out a detailed case showing why agents believe a Florida man is behind the disappearance of his estranged wife from her apartment in Spain, but gave no indication as to what they think happened to her.
Court documents released late Monday show officers believe David Knezevich resembles the man in a motorcycle helmet who spray-painted the security camera lens outside Ana Knezevich’s Madrid apartment on Feb. 2. The man left an hour later with a suitcase.
Spanish police say they have surveillance video of the 36-year-old Fort Lauderdale entrepreneur buying the same brand of paint and duct tape hours earlier. Investigators also interviewed a woman who says Knezevich asked her to translate a text message sent to his wife’s friends after her disappearance.
Knezevich’s attorney, Ken Padowitz, has said his client is innocent and was in his native Serbia on the day his 40-year-old wife disappeared, 1,500 miles away. But officers say Knezevich had rented a Peugeot in the Serbian capital Belgrade four days earlier.
A few days later, a Spanish driver reported that his license plates had been stolen. On the night Ana Knezevich disappeared, a license plate reader on her street in Madrid noted the stolen license plate, Spanish police discovered.
In addition, a Peugeot with the stolen license plates drove through a toll booth in a Madrid suburb hours after she disappeared, surveillance video showed. The driver could not be seen behind the tinted windows.
The rental company told investigators that when Knezevich returned the car five weeks later, the license plates had been replaced and the windows had been tinted. It had been driven almost 4,800 miles (7,700 kilometers).
The FBI arrested Knezevich, a naturalized American, at Miami International Airport on Saturday. He is charged with kidnapping and is being held pending a bail hearing. The Knezevichs, who sometimes spell their surname “Knezevic,” have been married for thirteen years. They own EOX Technology Solutions Inc., which provides computer support to businesses in South Florida. Records show they also own a home and two other properties in Fort Lauderdale, one of which is currently under foreclosure.
Ana’s brother, Juan Henao, called the couple’s separation “annoying” in an interview with a Fort Lauderdale detective, a report shows. He told police that David was angry that they were going to split a significant amount of money. Ana is a naturalized American from Colombia.
The most detailed part of the FBI’s 11-page complaint against Knezevich concerns an unnamed Colombian woman he met on a dating app last fall, around the time his wife moved to Europe.
The FBI says that the morning after his wife disappeared, Knezevich texted the woman asking for a favor: Would she translate a few English sentences into “perfect Colombian” Spanish for a friend who was writing a screenplay?
The woman responded that she doesn’t speak English and would have to use a generic online Spanish translator. Knezevich responded: That’s fine, she could change it to sound Colombian.
According to the FBI, he then sent the woman this passage in English: “I met someone wonderful. He has a summer house about 2 hours (two hours) from Madrid. We are going there now and I will spend a few days there. However, there is hardly any signal. I’ll call you when I get back. Kisses.”
The woman completed her translation and sent it back.
That morning, that translated message was sent from her phone to two of Ana’s friends.
They said it didn’t look like her. They contacted the Spanish police and started an investigation.