Eerie final moments of woman who was found dead in a latched freezer after a private party
Gerrard Kaonga
Featured Image Credit: Rosemont Police
Footage has shown the final moments of a 19-year-old girl was found unresponsive in a freezer at a hotel after attending a party.
Kenneka Jenkins tragically died in 2017 and CCTV footage of her final moments makes the situation even more eerie.
Back in September 2017, Jenkins attended a private party at Crowne Plaza Chicago O’Hare Hotel with some friends.
Unfortunately, during this night, the teen went missing and was discovered unresponsive in a walk-in kitchen freezer.
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Jenkins’ mother, Tereasa Martin, subsequently filed a lawsuit against the hotel in what ended up being a long legal battle.
According to Martin, Jenkins first visited the hotel on September 9 - with the lawsuit adding she was last seen leaving a room on the ninth floor by her friends.
However, after that, she then went missing.
Video footage, acquired by the police, has been released to the public and shows Jenkins stumbling around the hotel before making her way into the kitchen.
This video footage has now begun to do the rounds on social media.
In the video she is seen stepping out of an elevator alone, appearing intoxicated and bumping into walls as she walks down the hallway, at one point almost falling over.
A separate CCTV camera catches Jenkins walking into an empty kitchen and out of view, which authorities believe is when she entered the freezer.
The Cook County Medical Examiner's Office initially ruled that her death had been an accident and there was no reason to suspect foul play. Her cause of death was given as hypothermia after being exposed to the cold.
A toxicology report also found that she had alcohol and medication for epilepsy and migraines in her system.
Martin originally sought $50 million in connection to her daughter's death.
However, in 2023, she settled a lawsuit against the parent company of the hotel, security firm and restaurant, and received approximately $3.7 million.
Two other family members received a combined $2.7 million of the settlement fund.
Martin has previously spoken about how the CCTV images could have helped staff to locate her daughter.
In an interview on Chicago radio station 107.5 WGCI in 2017, she claimed that one camera was pointed at the entrance to the walk-in.
"There was a camera directly over this freezer," Martin said.
"...At the closing of the meeting I asked the detective as well as the sergeant and the sergeant said aggressively 'There wasn't no camera' so I guess the camera disappeared too."