SEREMBAN, Sept 3 — A total of eight fingerprints were lifted from a window at a jungle villa where Irish-French teen Nora Anne Quoirin supposedly exited and disappeared near here last year, a former state Criminal Investigations Department chief testified at the Coroner’s Court today.

Assistant Commissioner Wan Rukman Wan Hassan who previously headed the Negri Sembilan Criminal Investigation Department said the police made the findings after dusting the window at Sora House located within The Dusun resort for fingerprints.

He added that the fingerprints were lifted on August 4, 2019, subsequent to a missing persons report lodged by the resort owner and family on the same day.

"We managed to obtain eight fingerprints from the window frame and 20 samples taken from family members, workers, former workers and workers in an adjacent resort for our comparisons.

"The results which I was informed of on August 6, 2019 on the eight samples were as followed; four of them had inadequate features while four more were in suitable condition.

"Of the four that we compared with the 20 samples we obtained, only one matched the mother of the missing person while the remaining three were unknown,” Wak Rukman, the 11th witness in Quoirin’s inquest, told Coroner Maimoonah Aid.

When asked further what he meant by inadequate features by Quoirin’s lawyer S. Sakthyvell, Wak Rukman explained that these fingerprints could mean partial or side prints which rendered them unsuitable for analysis.

As for the three unknown fingerprints and whether Quoirin’s fingerprint could be one of them, Wak Rukman explained that it may also belong to the previous tenants before affirming that the authorities managed to obtain the girl’s fingerprint through the assistance of the International Criminal Police Organisation (Interpol).

"At that time when we lacked a sample, we did manage to obtain a fingerprint sample later from her home country through Interpol but it was her middle finger.

"But that too was incomplete, and we couldn’t make our comparison.

"Even after she was found and a sample taken, there was no positive result as her prints have shrivelled due to the exposure [of her body] to the environment,” he said.

In addition to the fingerprint dusting performed on the villa’s window where Quoirin was said to have exited, another window  near the attic where Quoirin had slept was also checked for fingerprints.

Eight more fingerprints were lifted there but none was complete enough to use for a comparison, Wan Rukman revealed.

Apart from fingerprint dusting, Wak Rukman also disclosed that luminol—a form of chemical substance used to detect the presence of blood—was also applied by a crime scene team lunder Deputy Superintendent C. Tharmalingam from Bukit Aman throughout the general areas of the house for the police’s criminal investigation.

"At that time, we also managed to obtain blood evidence in the form of blood drops in the washroom.

"But whose blood it belonged to I am not at liberty to say, maybe you could ask DSP Tharmalingam for the details,” he said.

Obtaining closed-circuit television footage

Describing the thoroughness of the criminal investigations conducted by his subordinates, Wak Rukman pointed out how he had instructed Assistant Superintendent Chong Meei Chyi then to obtain a copy of the closed-circuit television (CCTV) footage of the family’s arrival at the Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA).

At the time of the incident, Chong was Negri Sembilan Criminal Investigation Department’s Sexual, Women and Child Investigations Division officer and liaison officer to the family according to her testimony in court.

"The purpose of obtaining the footage was to probe the family’s prior arrival to Sora House, since our investigation comprised both search and criminal angles conducted concurrently.

"I thought it was reasonable to study the possibility of whether there were suspicious circumstances (surrounding their arrival),” he said, adding that he wanted to see if the family was followed and the veracity of the girl’s physical characteristics as described by her family.

Wan Rukman said he and Chong viewed the footage together and subsequently discovered discrepancies between information the family gave and what was depicted on the footage.

"I was told by the investigating officer that the missing person had difficulty walking due to her condition but in the footage she could be seen walking normally while tugging on her luggage behind her,” he explained.

During his first meeting with the family on August 5, 2019 at the scene, Wak Rukman said he noticed a broken latch on one of the windows from which Quoirin was said to have exited.

Quoirin, a 15-year-old with learning difficulties, disappeared from The Dusun resort last year where she was staying with her London-based family, triggering a 10-day hunt involving helicopters, search dogs and hundreds of searchers.

Her nude body was discovered close to the jungle retreat and an autopsy found that she probably starved and died of internal bleeding after spending about a week in the dense rainforest.