[UPDATED] Jenkins inquest: husband received distress call before she went missing

GEORGE TOWN – Malaysian-born Annapuranee Jenkins had made a distress call to her husband before she disappeared in Penang some five years ago, the coroner’s court here heard today.

The watching brief lawyer for the Jenkins family, S. Raveentharan, said Jenkins told her husband that she was detained by two unidentified Ukrainians, who also asked for her passport.

“There was a distress call by the late Annapuranee to her husband at approximately 5.22pm on 13 December 2017.

“The police report is explicitly clear that the late Annapuranee was arrested or withheld against her wishes by two Ukrainians,” he said in his opening remarks during the inquest into her disappearance today.

Raveentharan questioned why the police did not probe further into the distress call, including the identity of the owner of the landline Jenkins used and how a person familiar with Penang could suddenly disappear on the island.

State director of prosecution Datuk Khairul Anuar Abdul Halim, however, objected to Raveentharan’s opening remarks, arguing that he was giving a wrong impression on the case, especially to the media and international observers.

“His presence is only to help the court, and not to create fights. Let us do our job,” Khairul said.

The inquest was told that the Jenkins were returning guests at the Jen Hotel, where the couple stayed while on vacation in Malaysia in 2017.

Jen Hotel general manager O. Odayappan, the first witness called to the stand, said the couple were initially booked to stay from December 5-21 that year, though Annapuranee’s husband Frank extended his stay to December 25 after she went missing. 

Odayappan described the Jenkins as a “very friendly couple” and said the last time he met with Annapuranee was around midday of December 13.

"At that time, she said she wanted to visit her mother at the old folks’ home in Georgetown,” Odayappan told the inquest.

"Annapuranee also reported having problems with her Uber orders. Then she was seen walking down Magazine Road, heading to a taxi area located near a coffee shop."

No sign of her

Odayappan said he only found out about Jenkins’ disappearance the next day, after hearing from his staff that Frank, a former Royal Australian Air Force serviceman, had informed them that his wife had not returned after nearly 24 hours.

Hotel staff took Frank to the police station to lodge a report, and later drove him around to areas where she may have visited, he said.

Jenkins, then aged 67, was reportedly last seen around Jalan Scotland, among the busiest roads in Penang, on the day she disappeared on December 13, 2017.

She was believed to have taken an Uber from a dentist office in George Town to visit her mother at a nearby nursing home.

The driver alleged that Jenkins suddenly asked him to make an emergency stop while en route to the nursing home and exited the vehicle on a busy road. She was never seen again.

Her partial skeletal remains were found three years later at a construction site, some 2km away from where she was last seen.

Her mother C. Mary Anne died a year later at the age of 101.

The inquest continues tomorrow. – The Vibes, March 28, 2022