ROSEMONT HOTEL FREEZER DEATH RULED ACCIDENTAL
19- year- old Kenneka Jenkins died of hypothermia; alcohol, prescription Rx deemed contributing factors by medical examiner
Kenneka Jenkins, the 19- year- old Chicago woman found dead Sept. 10 in a hotel freezer in northwest suburban Rosemont last month, died of hypothermia, according to the Cook County medical examiner’s office.
Her death was ruled an accident. Alcohol and topiramate intoxication — a prescription drug used to treat epilepsy — were listed as contributing factors, according to the medical examiner’s office. Jenkins’ family said she was not prescribed topiramate.
Her blood alcohol level was 0.112, according to the medical examiner. Tests for “date rape” drugs came back negative.
Topiramate can cause “dizziness, impairedmemory, impaired concentration, poor coordination, confusion and impaired judgment,” according to the medical examiner.
Jenkins was attending a party in a room at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, according to Rosemont police, who are looking for the woman they believe paid for the room with a stolen credit card.
In a statement Friday, Rosemont police said they have interviewed 30 people who were in the room. Police are looking for another six who “are only known by street names” and family and friends won’t help police find them, according to the statement.
The medical examiner’s office said it couldn’t determine when exactly Jenkins died or how much alcohol she consumed. The freezer temperature was 34 degrees and the door was equipped “with a circular release mechanism.”
Jenkins was found about 21 hours after she was seen on surveillance footage walking through the hotel’s kitchen.
Attorneys for Jenkins’ mother filed an emergency petition Friday to preserve hotel surveillance recordings. The filing also asks the hotel to produce a schedule of any employees and independent contractors at the hotel from Sept. 8 through Sept. 10.
Twitter and Facebook have been flooded with conspiracy theories, with some speculating Jenkins was murdered in the freezer and her organs were harvested.
But the filing includes results of Jenkins’ postmortem examination, and states that all organs were present and intact.
In a statement released with Jenkins’ autopsy results, the medical examiner’s office pointedly refuted other theories:
“There is no evidence, per the police investigation, that Ms. Jenkins was forced to consume the alcohol or the drug. There is no evidence of another person in the vicinity of the kitchen with the decedent and there is no evidence of an altercation or interaction with another individual in the time immediately prior to demise. There was no other evidence of external or internal trauma due to physical abuse.”
Jenkins left home late Sept. 8 to go to the party, according to Rosemont police. Jenkins’ sister last heard from her via text message about 1: 30 a. m. Sept. 9.
About 4 a. m. on Sept. 9, Jenkins’ friends called her mother to say they could not find her, Chicago antiviolence activist Andrew Holmes has said. An hour later, Tereasa Martin — who had recently undergone a double mastectomy — was at the hotel. She filled out a police report, and Jenkins’ sister reported her missing.
Jenkins was reported missing at 1: 16 p. m. Police told Martin surveillance footage showed Jenkins inebriated near the front desk, according to Holmes.
Hotel staff and management discovered Jenkins in the freezer at 12: 24 a. m. Sept. 10, police said.
Martin’s attorneys contend employees knew the party — which had 20 underage attendees — was going on. Their motion also states several of the hotel’s walk- in freezers are equipped with padlocks, but not the one Jenkins was found in.
Those attorneys say they’ve been provided most security video they’ve requested, but not footage from two cameras — specifically, one “near the upstairs abandoned kitchen” and another outside the “lower level functioning kitchen.”
In a statement, the hotel offered condolences to Jenkins’ family, adding: “Her death stunned our company and saddened our employees.”
“As we previously assured the family’s attorney, we will preserve all the evidence they requested, including video recordings and documents,” the statement said. “In fact, we have already done so.”
Hotel security footage previously released shows Jenkins walking through the hotel, stumbling and struggling to keep her balance; none of the footage shows her going into the freezer.
Friday afternoon, a spokesman for Rosemont police said the case is still “an ongoing death investigation,” not a criminal matter.
Rosemont detectives have obtained four cellphones from people at the hotel party, including Jenkins’, obtained through a search warrant.
After her death, protesters gathered for several weeks outside the Crowne Plaza, calling for an FBI investigation— an ideaRosemont police quickly quashed.