GEORGE TOWN, July 19 — The family of an Australian woman, Anna Jenkins, who was reported missing in 2017 in Penang, is ready to send DNA samples to police for a comparative test aimed at finding out if a pelvic bone found in a forest near Jalan Batu Gantung, here recently, belonged to the victim.
Timur Laut District Police chief ACP Soffian Santong said the samples were being sent over because of restrictions on international travel due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
“We contacted the Australian High Commission in Malaysia to obtain DNA samples of the victim’s family members... and yesterday, the police received feedback from them that the family members had agreed to send it from there,” he told reporters after visiting the construction site where the bone was found along with some clothes and other items here today.
On June 24, a worker who was doing landscape work at the site chanced upon the bone and other items scattered a few metres apart from each other.
Soffian said the site was about three kilometres away from where the victim was last reported to be seen on Jalan Scotland, adding that high-resolution pictures of the items, which included a toothbrush, cross, clothing items, glasses, and hotel access card were also sent to the family for identification purposes.
“Investigations have also revealed that the place where the bone and other items were found was still a jungle in 2017 when the victim was reported missing, and is currently being developed into a residential area. We will also investigate how the items and bone had got there,” he said.
Meanwhile, Soffian stressed that the police had never stopped investigations into the missing person’s case as alleged in the Australian media, and that any leads would be used to unravel the mystery behind Anna Jenkin’s disappearance.
He said the police would also record the statements of several individuals including the manager and employees at the project site, besides calling back the e-hailing driver who had ferried the woman before she disappeared to assist in the investigation.
On December 13, 2017, Jenkins, 65, was said to have headed out of her hotel room for a dental appointment in Pulau Tikus, and after the treatment, asked staff at the clinic to help her hail a car to go to a charity home in Batu Lanchang.
The woman asked the driver to drop her near a traffic lights on Jalan Scotland, but for safety purposes, the driver dropped her off at a school nearby. She has since been reported missing and a police report was lodged by her husband. — Bernama
