In the Spanish town of Alisante, an autopsy was performed on the body of 24-year-old Jakov Jelkić on Tuesday, on which no traces of violence were observed, so the police assume that he died due to falling into the cold sea at night under the influence of alcohol.
“We assume it’s an accident,” a police spokesman from Alisante told Hina news agency on Tuesday night. Earlier in the day, police held a press conference in the coastal city in southeastern Spain.
Jelkić, a Croatian football player of the Swiss third league team Granža Paćot, spent last week with his teammates in Alisante, where they had previously played a game.
On the night from Friday to Saturday, the players were in a nightclub, from where they headed to the hotel. Jelkić returned to the club to get his jacket, and the surveillance cameras recorded that he left alone around 2:30 a.m.
His teammates did not find him in the hotel room in the morning, so they reported him missing. Jelkić’s sister Janja launched a big search from Switzerland through social networks, media and institutions.
“We raised drones and searched for him. Every police officer in Alisante knew about the disappearance,” said a spokesman from the city of about 359,000. “It was about an athlete, a person for whom such a disappearance is not normal, so we searched”.
Police reviewed camera footage and searched the wider area where he was last seen. She discovered the body on Monday at 5:30 p.m. in the sea near the pier where there are stone piers. He was found a kilometer away from the night club. That distance can be walked in ten minutes, the spokesman said.
During the autopsy, sea water was found in the lungs, so the investigators concluded that he died by drowning.
“No signs of violence were found on the body, and considering his walking behavior recorded on the cameras, we concluded that he fell into the sea. The sea is cold at this time of the year, and he was alone,” the spokesman said.
“We will continue the investigation because the autopsy of the body is only one part of it. All information will be analyzed, but from everything known so far, it seems that it was an accident,” he added.
On Monday, after her brother’s body was found, Jakov’s sister Janja wrote on her status: “My beautiful eye, my love, happiness, dear brother. I love you forever!”.
“I tried everything, but I didn’t succeed,” she added. She included hearts and candles with the post.
On Friday, the day before Jakov disappeared, the police discovered the body of a 39-year-old woman who was in a wheelchair due to paralysis in the sea. Her body was found 500 meters from the place where the young Croat was found.
“Those two cases are not connected. In the case of that woman, it was a case of suicide,” said the police spokesman.
Alisante is visited by thousands of tourists in the summer for the sun and the sea. The police say that in previous years there have been cases of elderly people and children drowning in the sea in front of the sandy beach.
“But what happened last weekend, these two loss of life, is an unusual case,” the spokesman concluded, Hina writes.
