16 troubling questions about the Black Death case after witnesses claim ‘kidnap’ girl Chloe Ayling and captor ‘looked like a couple’
QUESTIONS were mounting last night over the alleged kidnap of a British glamour girl by sex slavers.
Witnesses who saw model Chloe Ayling with suspected abductor Lukasz Herba said they thought they were a couple.
One even claimed he had seen the pair laughing and joking together while visiting a cafe in Milan, Italy.
Chloe’s lawyer confirmed she went shopping for groceries and shoes with Polish-born Herba a day before she turned up at the British consulate, saying she’d been kidnapped.
Meanwhile photos emerged of the model lying on a floor with one breast exposed.
It is thought they were taken while in captivity and were to be used to “auction” her by crime syndicate Black Death.
Chloe, 20, was seen yesterday on a motorbike speeding away from her home in Coulsdon, South London — as celebrity agents acting for her were busily trying to sell her story to the highest bidder.
And it also emerged that the model’s infant son lives with her ex.
Chloe has told how she was snatched, drugged and taken to a remote farmhouse after arriving in Milan for a fake photoshoot.
She said she was held for a week before being set free.
Herba, 30 — living in Oldbury, West Midlands — faced court in Milan last week.
Yesterday a waiter at the city’s Farina Cucina cafe told how he saw Chloe with Herba before they walked into the British consulate.
He said: “She seemed happy and relaxed, they stayed for about two hours.
"They were laughing and joking.”
16 Questions about abduction of glamour model Chloe after she was seen joking with captor
1. How well did Chloe and Herba know each other?
A PAL of Chloe’s said she met Polish-born Herba at a Paris photoshoot in April months before the kidnap.
Another source said they “may have been seen together on other occasions.”
Chloe paints a picture of Herba, who has been arrested on suspicion of her kidnapping, as a kindly captor.
She said he removed duct tape from her mouth and took off her cuffs when he arrived at a property near the French border.
She added that Herba, who lives in Oldbury, West Mids, was furious the group snatched a mother and told her he paid most of her ransom.
2. Why did she go to the fake photoshoot?
A PHOTOGRAPHER — who may have been Herba — requested Chloe through her agent, Phil Green.
The photoshoot was at a “recognised studio in the city centre” in Milan on July 11 and was paid for in advance.
Phil, who runs Supermodel Agency, said: “We ask lots of questions of new clients.
“Who are you, what do you want the shoot for, what is Chloe required to do, have you got a website and examples of your previous work?
“There was nothing we thought suspicious at all.
“Chloe had spoken to the photographer on the phone, too.”
When she arrived, a man allegedly grabbed her by the neck while another injected ketamine into her arm.
Hair was found in the boot of the car, traces of ketamine in her blood and a syringe mark on her arm.
3. What really happened during the six-day ordeal?
CHLOE said she was terrified “second by second, minute by minute, hour by hour”.
She also claimed she feared being killed if she tried to escape.
Yet, she went shoe shopping with Herba, who also fed her chocolate.
Chloe said they had developed a trusting relationship. He allowed her to shower and gave her fresh underwear and T-shirts to wear each day.
4. How many kidnappers were there?
CHLOE says there were five but reports from Italian police suggest there were just two.
It is thought the authorities want to talk to Herba’s brother, 36-year-old Mikal, as a witness.
5. Why no bruises when she spoke to the media?
CHLOE said she was stuffed into a bag, driven in the boot of a car for two hours to near the French border, then handcuffed to a chest of drawers. Four weeks later, any visible evidence of her ordeal had disappeared.
6. Why didn't she escape when she had the chance?
CHLOE said: “I never went outside because he prohibited it.”
Yet her lawyer said Chloe was allowed to leave the farmhouse to buy new shoes with her captor.
Francesco Pesce said she thought it best to go along with his ideas.
He said: “So, she abided to his request, ‘Let’s go and buy groceries,’ and ‘You need shoes, let’s go buy shoes,’ and she didn’t try to flee.”