Found Deceased Cambodia - Amelia Bambridge, 21, UK backpacker, Koh Rong, 23 Oct 2019

I’m curious about how she became disengaged from her ‘sack/bag’. She seemed to be wearing it across her body in all photos and it is exactly designed for that purpose. I can’t imagine a scenario where she would remove it ... except for one... and I don’t want to think about that right now.

Even if she felt woozy and sat down on the rock...and suddenly needed to vomit it is unlikely that she would remove it first, maybe just slide it around to her back. And if she was attacked I doubt the perpetrator would remove it unless he intended to steal it. I just can’t think of any reason for her or anyone to remove it and place it on the rock ... unless they intended for it to be found ... but why?

There is growing suspicion that the bag was implicated at the rock as a diversion. In all likelyhood, Amelia's bag was probably either lost beforehand in the club, the abductor(s) might have put it there to throw off the investigation with a false lead, or the Cambodian police chose to put it there to try and fix the drowning narrative to suit the tourism agenda.

I hope the bag has been checked for fingerprints and was handled appropriately when it was found, but I doubt it.

It is very hard to believe Amelia would have left a busy club with hostel pals, with hours of partying yet to go, in favour of a shoreline wonder, alone, in a position of great danger, nightswimming in blind darkness.

Who would do this?.
 
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It is very hard to believe Amelia would have left a busy club with hostel pals, with hours of partying yet to go, in favour of a shoreline wonder, alone, in a position of great danger, nightswimming in blind darkness.

Who would do this?.

Loads of people would rather sit by the shore, enjoy the ambience and talk for a bit than spend the entire night dancing to loud bad psytrance... Unless she's in the habit of swimming fully clothed and in Birkenstocks, or someone stole her clothes but not her money and phone, she didn't go for a swim.

See the last bit of this video:
The rocks are right outside the bar. The bag would have been in direct sight of the bar.

There really seems to be no leads on this... The only unanswered questions are about the vague quote about her being caught on CCTV leaving the beach. If we knew where, if she was alone, and if she had her bag, this could make everything seem a lot clearer.

The publicity around Amelia's disappearance has been much higher, but remember Katherine Grgich's body wasn't found for six days when she was murdered on Koh Rong, and it wasn't even hidden. Left for Dead - The Cambodia Daily
 
VIDEO: Police question dozens as hope fades for Bambridge’s rescue - Khmer Times

Major General Chuon Narin, provincial police chief, said police have so far questioned 20 people as part of their investigation.

“We invited them for questioning about the missing British woman,” he said. “Only two remain for questioning; the others were allowed to go home.”


Looks like the Daily Mail line on six being arrested isn't true; only two are still in police custody and they haven't been charged with anything.

Six men who work at restaurants, hotels and guesthouses on the island were questioned and released without charge on Tuesday. Officials said the men were brought into custody because of complaints by Western tourists that they had acted badly towards visiting women.

Police fear missing backpacker drowned
 
Six men who work at restaurants, hotels and guesthouses on the island were questioned and released without charge on Tuesday. Officials said the men were brought into custody because of complaints by Western tourists that they had acted badly towards visiting women.

Police fear missing backpacker drowned

Yep, I posted that link in reply #280 :)

So frustrating that there's still no leads...
 

Finally! Why were they not brought in earlier?

I’m curious about how she became disengaged from her ‘sack/bag’. She seemed to be wearing it across her body in all photos and it is exactly designed for that purpose. I can’t imagine a scenario where she would remove it ... except for one... and I don’t want to think about that right now.

Even if she felt woozy and sat down on the rock...and suddenly needed to vomit it is unlikely that she would remove it first, maybe just slide it around to her back. And if she was attacked I doubt the perpetrator would remove it unless he intended to steal it. I just can’t think of any reason for her or anyone to remove it and place it on the rock ... unless they intended for it to be found ... but why?

The only thing I can think of why she herself would remove her bag and place it on the rock is if she wanted to wade around in the ocean for a bit and feared it would get wet as it was hanging quite low on her hip. Maybe she sat on the rock at first, then might have walked in thigh-high water along the coast for a bit (she had shorts on) and then forgot the bag. Just speculation of course.

They should show the cctv of her leaving. LE should also publicly appeal to everyone who was at the party that night to contact them.
 
Loads of people would rather sit by the shore, enjoy the ambience and talk for a bit than spend the entire night dancing to loud bad psytrance... Unless she's in the habit of swimming fully clothed and in Birkenstocks, or someone stole her clothes but not her money and phone, she didn't go for a swim.

See the last bit of this video:
The rocks are right outside the bar. The bag would have been in direct sight of the bar.

There really seems to be no leads on this... The only unanswered questions are about the vague quote about her being caught on CCTV leaving the beach. If we knew where, if she was alone, and if she had her bag, this could make everything seem a lot clearer.

The publicity around Amelia's disappearance has been much higher, but remember Katherine Grgich's body wasn't found for six days when she was murdered on Koh Rong, and it wasn't even hidden. Left for Dead - The Cambodia Daily

Nice work there Mersault.

The thing is, nobody would be looking:- everyone is in the venue partying and it would probably be too dark to see with the contrast anyway.

Cambodian men know this area will attract alot of drunk female tourists with scores of opportunities. I suspect eyes from the surrounding jungle were on the venue or the nearby paths looking to spot any vulnerable women wondering/staggering off alone.

Mersault, I am toying with the idea that she could have been muzzled and kidnapped by a local man on the island, is being held captive in a house on the island for a sex slave. How plausable do you think is this?.

The police you would think would not conduct routine house searches unless they had reason to do so.

I'm thinking the local abductor may have either placed the bag at the location where Amelia was captured or he returned later the following night when there was no club night on at police beach, and just implicated the bag then in the early hours.
 
The only thing I can think of why she herself would remove her bag and place it on the rock is if she wanted to wade around in the ocean for a bit and feared it would get wet as it was hanging quite low on her hip. Maybe she sat on the rock at first, then might have walked in thigh-high water along the coast for a bit (she had shorts on) and then forgot the bag.

I can see that. I can't imagine she'd have been on the rocks by herself though. But if she'd been sat with a group, drinking and smoking for a while, she might have taken it off and had it beside her. Then if new people came and she needed to move up, or she nipped to the loo leaving the bag with her friends, I can see it getting lost in the darkness if people moved around.

The other option I can think of is she went out to the rocks for a bit of privacy, and taken it off to make out with someone, then either forgot it or it got lost on the rocks.

Either way, someone she was with must know something they're not letting on...

RSBM

The article posted above states that it was video of her heading to the party but not returning -

They have been checking the trails around the beach after CCTV showed her heading to the party just before 2am but not returning.
Amelia Bambridge: Specialist dog to help search for missing British backpacker in Cambodia

Hi Tortoise. This post from Khmer Times (Rescue workers continue search for Amelia Bambridge - Khmer Times) says:

Nuon Bunthol, governor of Koh Rong city... “We checked one shop’s CCTV camera footage and saw her walking away [from the beach], but not coming back,” he added.

I don't think this CCTV has been released, nor do we know the time, where the shop is, if she's alone or had her bag.
 
Mersault, I am toying with the idea that she could have been muzzled and kidnapped by a local man on the island, is being held captive in a house on the island for a sex slave. How plausable do you think is this?.

It's possible, but very few Khmer men live alone. Most live with extended families and in houses or huts that are close together. One thing I suggested from the start was that a man with access to empty hostel/hotel rooms could have convinced her to stay the night and look for her stuff in the morning (no guarantee she'd have access to her room if she'd lost keys and it's a long trek in the dark). I don't know if all hotels and hostels have been searched fully. It's not yet high season in Cambodia so there'd be empty rooms.

EDIT: the bag was found on the morning she disappeared, not the day after. It was the Thursday morning, before 11.30am as this is when Ryan returned to the island and raised the alarm.

EDIT 2 (sorry!): just to say Khmer society's pretty sexually open and casual relationships are common, as are sex workers. It's not like somewhere like India where there are hordes of repressed, frustrated men and violent rapes are common, or the Thai islands, which are often largely Muslim and sometimes unused to scantily-clad women. Though I'm sure many young Khmer men would like to try out having sex with a Western woman, and rapes do happen, there's not a huge *advertiser censored*/Madonna complex problem. Touristic places like Koh Rong have pretty settled communities with a mix of medium-term expats and locals working in the tourist hostels and bars, who'd all know each other pretty well.
 
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A remote island paradise where a British backpacker mysteriously disappeared last week has a dark and deadly history.

Since 2013, the jungle-covered island of Koh Rong in Cambodia has seen a spate of horror attacks on tourists, including at least one murder. Others have been violently robbed and assaulted or found dead in suspicious or bizarre circumstances.

Ms Bambridge’s disappearance comes almost exactly five years after an American tourist vanished in mysterious circumstances, only to be found murdered.

Palm Springs massage therapist Katherine Grgich, 55, was last seen in her hotel room on September 28, 2013. Her body was found five days later, partially clothed and with her throat slit, in the forest three kilometres away.

The case remains unresolved, with Ms Grgich’s family and friends accusing island police of trying to cover up the crime by passing it off as death by misadventure.

Another tourist visiting the island at the time described the horror of discovering the American’s body.

“On the first night, we were in a bar where they announced that an American woman named Katherine (same name as me) had been missing for around five days and they were having a search party the following morning,” account Katherine2707 said in a post to TripAdvisor.

“Obviously, I had to try my best to help, so me and my friend went along. After trekking through the forest for over two hours, we decided to turn back to the beach, until we were stopped by some local men.

“Knowing very little English, they were trying to tell us that they had found her, so we followed them. To my horror, we had found her. Hardly any clothes on, throat had been cut and had been left there for days.

“Words cannot describe seeing this, I was in absolute shock. We told them they needed to ring the Cambodian police. We decided to leave the island that day, as we didn’t feel safe. We left our details with the search party for future reference, which is a good job.

“Less than a week later, we decided to look up what had happened after Katherine’s body was found. To our disbelief, we found an article saying that it was an accident. IT WAS NOT AN ACCIDENT!!

“We urgently got in touch with the US embassy to write statements on what we saw and found. Despite all of this, justice still hasn’t been found and Katherine’s killer is still out there.”

In 2015, dual British Canadian citizen Michael Hay, 26, and his friend 49-year-old Finnish national Jouni Niemi, were robbed and assaulted at Koh Rong’s Broken Heart Guesthouse in an attack so violent they almost died.

According to the Khmer Times, the victims were transporting a bag of cash and valuables from reception to Mr Niemi’s bungalow when they were ambushed by a gang armed with torches, batons and a dumbbell.

“The two employees who stayed at the reception area could not see or hear past a thick cover of trees around the bungalow,” the paper said, quoting a witness.

“The attackers allegedly blinded their victims with flashlights, then struck Mr Hay over the head. Then they beat both victims with batons, stones and a dumbbell.

“They took Mr Niemi down to the sea and nearly drowned him. His employee was left bleeding on the ground near the bungalow. The attackers fled with $US3000, a camera, and business documents from the box.

Later, a Russian employee of the guesthouse found a blood-covered laptop under the stairs of his boss’s bungalow.

Amelia Bambridge: UK tourist vanishes on Koh Rong, an island with a dark past
 
I can see that. I can't imagine she'd have been on the rocks by herself though. But if she'd been sat with a group, drinking and smoking for a while, she might have taken it off and had it beside her. Then if new people came and she needed to move up, or she nipped to the loo leaving the bag with her friends, I can see it getting lost in the darkness if people moved around.

The other option I can think of is she went out to the rocks for a bit of privacy, and taken it off to make out with someone, then either forgot it or it got lost on the rocks.

Either way, someone she was with must know something they're not letting on...



Hi Tortoise. This post from Khmer Times (Rescue workers continue search for Amelia Bambridge - Khmer Times) says:

Nuon Bunthol, governor of Koh Rong city... “We checked one shop’s CCTV camera footage and saw her walking away [from the beach], but not coming back,” he added.

I don't think this CCTV has been released, nor do we know the time, where the shop is, if she's alone or had her bag.
Hi, I saw that but I was wondering if we are getting confused reports. The square brackets [from the beach] looks as if it could be journo input and not a direct quote. Anyway, I just thought it's something to bear in mind, there could be two lots of cctv, one arriving and one leaving but I'm not sure why they think she should come back if she was leaving.
 
Yeah it's confusing, I think there's three CCTV videos:

  1. Leaving The Nest/on way to party with friends at around 2am (released to press [30 seconds in] - CCTV shows missing backpacker Amelia Bambridge on way to party in Cambodia)
  2. Arriving at the Police Beach bar, time unknown (released to press [5 seconds in] - Amelia Bambridge pictured hours before vanishing | Daily Mail Online)
  3. Passing a shop to walk away from the beach, time unknown (not released to press?)

But there's been loads of confusion in the press so who knows.
 
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A remote island paradise where a British backpacker mysteriously disappeared last week has a dark and deadly history.

Since 2013, the jungle-covered island of Koh Rong in Cambodia has seen a spate of horror attacks on tourists, including at least one murder. Others have been violently robbed and assaulted or found dead in suspicious or bizarre circumstances.

Ms Bambridge’s disappearance comes almost exactly five years after an American tourist vanished in mysterious circumstances, only to be found murdered.

Palm Springs massage therapist Katherine Grgich, 55, was last seen in her hotel room on September 28, 2013. Her body was found five days later, partially clothed and with her throat slit, in the forest three kilometres away.

The case remains unresolved, with Ms Grgich’s family and friends accusing island police of trying to cover up the crime by passing it off as death by misadventure.

Another tourist visiting the island at the time described the horror of discovering the American’s body.

“On the first night, we were in a bar where they announced that an American woman named Katherine (same name as me) had been missing for around five days and they were having a search party the following morning,” account Katherine2707 said in a post to TripAdvisor.

“Obviously, I had to try my best to help, so me and my friend went along. After trekking through the forest for over two hours, we decided to turn back to the beach, until we were stopped by some local men.

“Knowing very little English, they were trying to tell us that they had found her, so we followed them. To my horror, we had found her. Hardly any clothes on, throat had been cut and had been left there for days.

“Words cannot describe seeing this, I was in absolute shock. We told them they needed to ring the Cambodian police. We decided to leave the island that day, as we didn’t feel safe. We left our details with the search party for future reference, which is a good job.

“Less than a week later, we decided to look up what had happened after Katherine’s body was found. To our disbelief, we found an article saying that it was an accident. IT WAS NOT AN ACCIDENT!!

“We urgently got in touch with the US embassy to write statements on what we saw and found. Despite all of this, justice still hasn’t been found and Katherine’s killer is still out there.”

In 2015, dual British Canadian citizen Michael Hay, 26, and his friend 49-year-old Finnish national Jouni Niemi, were robbed and assaulted at Koh Rong’s Broken Heart Guesthouse in an attack so violent they almost died.

According to the Khmer Times, the victims were transporting a bag of cash and valuables from reception to Mr Niemi’s bungalow when they were ambushed by a gang armed with torches, batons and a dumbbell.

“The two employees who stayed at the reception area could not see or hear past a thick cover of trees around the bungalow,” the paper said, quoting a witness.

“The attackers allegedly blinded their victims with flashlights, then struck Mr Hay over the head. Then they beat both victims with batons, stones and a dumbbell.

“They took Mr Niemi down to the sea and nearly drowned him. His employee was left bleeding on the ground near the bungalow. The attackers fled with $US3000, a camera, and business documents from the box.

Later, a Russian employee of the guesthouse found a blood-covered laptop under the stairs of his boss’s bungalow.

Amelia Bambridge: UK tourist vanishes on Koh Rong, an island with a dark past

Same in Thailand too, (Koh Tao, Koh Samui), both racking up worrying numbers of murdered or unexplained deaths of western tourists in recent years, and the problem seems to be getting worse each year as the exotic message and culture attracts more and more naive and young revellers in particular who come and lose it.

Its not just the safety element but its the entire judicial process and incompetance. Crime scenes are not being secured, vital evidence is being spoilt or tampered with:- Framing's and coercion of innocent parties are commonplace.

The challenge now is changing the well established cheap party destination mindset that many young westerners see SE Asia as.

It might cost a fair bit more to party in Ayia Napa, Alicante, Budapest or Honolulu:- but its a price surely worth paying for a more secure and safer environment.

Too much injustice, too many are needlessly continuing to lose their lives on their vacations on these islands.
 
If there's cctv of her leaving the party I wonder a) if she had her bag with her, b) if she seems intoxicated, c) which direction was she heading, and d) if anyone followed her. Would be great if those points were addressed by LE.
 
If there's cctv of her leaving the party I wonder a) if she had her bag with her, b) if she seems intoxicated, c) which direction was she heading, and d) if anyone followed her. Would be great if those points were addressed by LE.

I’m wondering if it’s not been released because she’s really intoxicated. In the first interviews with her dad, he was pretty adamant that she’d gone inland and been abducted.
 
Amelia's brother spoke to reporters today:


Speaking to reporters, Mr Bambridge said they intend to hire a specialised jungle search team to find the missing 21-year-old.

He said: “We had use of a dog today, which proved beneficial and gave us some more hope.

“And also, we are looking to hire a private jungle search team.”

Mr Bambridge added the family thinks the lack of information about his sister’s movements on October 23 is “suspect".

He said: “You know, it’s a party. It’s not that busy. There’s plenty of staff there. One minute she’s there and next she’s gone. And no-one seems to know right now.”

Mr Bambridge also reiterated his father Phil’s suggestion that his sister could have been abducted.

“I totally believe that someone knows what’s happened to her,” Mr Bambridge said.

“And, you know, it’s just a matter of finding some information that’s going to tell us more about what’s happened."

Family of British backpacker Amelia Bambridge to hire jungle searchers
 
EDIT 2 (sorry!): just to say Khmer society's pretty sexually open and casual relationships are common, as are sex workers. It's not like somewhere like India where there are hordes of repressed, frustrated men and violent rapes are common, or the Thai islands, which are often largely Muslim and sometimes unused to scantily-clad women.

In the case of more permissive Cambodia, the sexual motives could be:

- Paid sex with prostitutes? Good, but not genuine.
- Sexual relations with relatively permissive local women? Good, but not exotic enough anymore.

Conclusion: Western women must be extremely permissive and willing to uhmm..... "party" all the time. Followed by: "This one turned me down! Now, I am angry, insulted and frustrated... "
 
I ask three questions;
Was she, Amelia, targeted to the exclusion of any other woman there and they knew who they were taking?
Was she just in the wrong place at the right time and abducted because someone wanted a woman, not even knowing her name?
What was she doing and who was she talking to and where was she for the weeks just prior to her missing?

These answers go to motive, planning and outcome.
 
Finally! Why were they not brought in earlier?
It might have taken the police a few days to identify them as the men were not seen with the possible victim. Rather, the criteria seems to be:

- local men who have been identified as being relatively aggressive towards women tourists

Thus, it probably took a few days of interviewing other tourists and semi expatriates to identify the men. Then factor in that many of the witnesses probably did not know their names.

Rather, they just identified them as say: "The guy at the jet ski rental who turns into an octopus at dusk." Or, "the bar tender who repeatedly tries to set up trysts". All in all, I think they identified and found these men pretty fast.
 
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It might have taken the police a few days to identify them as the men were not seen with the possible victim. Rather, the criteria seems to be:

- local men who have been identified as being relatively aggressive towards women tourists

Thus, it probably took a few days of interviewing other tourists and semi expatriates to identify the men. Then factor in that many of the witnesses probably did not know their names. Rather, they just identified them as say: "The guy at the jet ski rental who turns into an octopus at dusk." Or, "the bar tender who repeatedly tries to set up the trysts".

All in all, I think they identified and found these men pretty fast.

My comment "Finally! Why were they not brought in earlier?" was in regards to the search dogs ;)
 

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