Ivana Smit via Instagram Ivana Smit
Ivana Smit was a Dutch model who died tragically in December 2017 after falling from a 20th floor apartment in Malaysia. While authorities ruled it an accident, Smits’ grandparents, Hendrik and Susan Smit, are taking legal action against the American couple Alexander and Luna Johnson, who owned the apartment she fell from, and with whom their daughter was drinking, partying and engaging in a threesome the night of her death.
The Johnsons have since moved to Miami, and are countersuing the Smits’s family for defamation. “We are innocent, but have been under fire for a year and a half due to a smear campaign,” the couple the couple said. “Enough is enough. The Smit family suffered an unimaginable loss with the death of Ivana. Proceedings against them are the last thing we want, but what choice to we have but to go to court if this continues? They want the whole world to attack us.”
Ivana was only 18-years-old when her naked body was found on the 6th floor of the Capsquares Residences in Kuala Lumpur. At the time, she was in a relationship with boyfriend Lukas Kramer and the former pageant queen loved to play drums, piano and guitar, before starting work as a mo at age 14.
Here’s what you need to know about Ivana Smit:
1. Ivana was a Finalist ‘Top Model Belgium’
Before her death, Ivana was set to appear on Top Model Belgium, which would’ve been a huge break for the aspiring model, a major reason why her family hired a private investigator to study their daughter’s death, as they don’t believe it was suicide. Her uncle Fred Agenjo Weinhold told The Sun, “She promised she would be in Belgium for the Top Model final- but she came back in a casket.”
Ivana’s family acquired the services of Mr. Williams-Thomas, a former cop in Surrey, and award-winning presenter of the documentary, The Other Side of Jimmy Savile documentary on ITV, to find out exactly what happened the night of her death, as they don’t agree with the local police’s findings. The search was preempted by Malaysian coroner, Mahyon Talib, who ultimately ruled that no crime had been committed, had found “grip marks on her arm, the trauma at the back of her head, the broken bottles and Alex’s DNA under Ivana’s nails suggest that there might have been a possibility that there was a struggle.”
2. She Was Dating Boyfriend Lukas Kramer
Ivana was dating 21-year-old Lukas Kramer, a German broker who worked with an American shipping company. Though they had only been dating a month, the couple was cohabiting, buying new furniture at Ikea, and planning to attend a wedding together that February. The night before she died, he came home form work and as usual, they had dinner together. While Lukas was tired, Ivana went out for what she told him was Ladies’ Night.
Lukas, who’s now in a relationship with model Syasya Othman, told Unreserved, “I gave her a call and she picked it up, it was like 6:30 a.m. or something, she said she was staying at a girlfriend’s place, I didn’t know anything about the guy. She said she was going to get some sleep, and that it had been a long night.”
An hour later, Ivana sent him a picture of her with Luna, “Something happened between 7:24 a.m., when she sent me the last picture, and 10 a.m. when she died,” Lukas said. He steadfast believes that his girlfriend was not suicidal, and that she as looking forward to their future together. She posted a photo of the couple on Instagram with the caption, ““I am so totally, completely, overwhelming, (sic) eye poppingly, life changingly, spectacularly, passionately, deliciously in love with you @lukaskramer”.
3. Her ‘Hostess’ Job Might’ve Been Code For High-End Escort
Freelance model and “hostess” Emitsa Shz explains that “When models arrive from another country, they would want to go out. The models who are here earlier would know where to go for parties or model’s night. The group chats are primarily used for networking and for work where the job description isn’t very clear-cut. These are the party jobs.”
“Party jobs pay more,” Emitsa said. “There are party jobs that pay, for example $500 for three hours, just to go out, and sexual favors are not a permanent part of being a “hostess,” which Ivana included in her Instagram bio. Emitsa says being a “hostess” is different from being an escort, but adds “Some models don’t know how to say no to these sorts of things. When they get into these situations, they can get really hurt. The worst thing that could happen is that they die, they get sexually harassed, they get raped, or they get into drugs.”
“There is a big problem in Malaysia when it comes to drugs, especially when models are led to another party or an after-party,” Emitsa said, inferring that Ivana’s story isn’t so rare, and why she’s taking an initiative to help protect young women in the industry. “If a model dies then it’s usually ‘Oh okay she must be suicidal’ or ‘oh okay she must have been doing drugs’ but no one would say if there was a man who drugged this girl or took advantage of her. You just never hear that.”
4. Ivana Grew Up With Her Grandparents
While Ivana’s father Marcel was the first learn of her death, his first call were to Hendrik and Susan, his parents, the ones who actually raised his daughter. “I took care of her since she was a baby,” Susan said. “Everywhere we went, she went.” When Ivana was three-years-old, she moved to Penang to live with her grandparents full time. Hendrik explained further, “My son has a business and he was very busy, so he asked us to take care of her. The first time was just for a few hours, but later her daddy said, let her stay with you.”
While growing up Ivana loved playing piano, drums and took ballet lessons, as a teen, she was drawn to the modeling industry. “She liked to be in the spotlight,” Hendrik said. “She is a girl who wants attention from people, that’s the reason she liked modeling.”
5. The Johnsons’ Young Daughter Was Home The Night Ivana Died
Ivana first met 45-year-old American Alexander Johnson, a cryptocurrency trader, and his Kazakh wife, Lunara “Luna” Almazkyzy, 31, at a club on Halloween, and the trio hit it off. The Johnsons admit to having relationships like this in the past, but never as long as theirs lasted with Ivana.
While at first they denied having an sexual interaction with Ivana, the Johnsons eventually admitted to the Daily Mail that they had a threesome with Ivana the night she died. “Ivana was hammered. I kept talking to her as I got my daughter ready for school. Ivana lay down while I took her there”, Luna said. It wasn’t until she returned 30 minutes later, sans daughter, who’s now 5, that things got sexual.
Luna and Alex have since made their social media profiles private, and allege they left Malaysia after receiving kidnapping threats.
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