A Chicago community activist says he viewed video footage from a Rosemont hotel that shows Kenneka Jenkins walk into a freezer alone.
Jenkins, 19, was found dead inside the freezer in the basement of the Crowne Plaza Chicago O’Hare Hotel on Sunday.
Andrew Holmes told the Chicago Tribune that police allowed him to observe hotel surveillance video after he expressed concerns about the investigation.
He said he saw Jenkins waiting in the lobby area after her friends went back up to a hotel room to retrieve her cell phone and car keys.
He said Jenkins took the elevator to the basement and wanders around disoriented, opening and closing doors.
Finally, he said, the teenager opens two doors in a kitchen area and walks into the freezer alone. She is not seen alive again.
Holmes said he is confident no one forced Jenkins into the freezer. He said the family is awaiting toxicology tests to determine if drugs were in her system.
From the beginning, Rosemont police insisted Jenkins was drunk and walked into the freezer. But social media sleuths jumped to wild conclusions after analyzing a Facebook Live video recorded by one of her friends at a party in a hotel room on the 9th floor of the hotel.
The amateur sleuths claimed Jenkins was drugged, raped and stuffed into the freezer by the teenager’s friends who were employees of the hotel.
“The important part is we all wanted to know: Did anybody call her down there?” he said. “Did anybody force her down there? Was there anybody on the other side of the room when she got down there? And the answer to that is no.”
Rosemont police spokesman Det. Joe Balogh said police has released the surveillance video to Jenkins’ family and to the Cook County Medical Examiner.
No cause of death has been released to the public.
A spokesman for the Crowne Plaza said Thursday that the hotel has offered to pay for Jenkins’ funeral.
“Our hearts go out to Kenneka’s mother, her family and friends,” said the spokesman, Glenn Harston. “We hope covering the funeral costs provides a small bit of relief for them.”
