The family of Nora Quoirin have requested the ending of “unhelpful” comments by family members or those claiming to act on their behalf following the death of their daughter in a Malaysian jungle.
The 15-year-old’s unclothed body was discovered on Tuesday 1.6 miles from a holiday resort where the family had been staying.
Early on Saturday the teenager’s family issued a statement asking the media to only rely on comments issued on their behalf by the Lucie Blackman Trust (LBT).
“Nora’s family are concerned that continued reporting of comments such as those recently reported are unhelpful and may hinder any investigations, as well as causing confusion and distress for them,” the statement said.
“The Lucie Blackman Trust is arranging repatriation of Nora’s body and no further information concerning this, including dates or destinations, will be released at this point.”
Malaysian police said following a postmortem that Nora starved after her disappearance and there was no evidence of abduction or kidnapping “for the time being”.
The family confirmed in Saturday’s statement that no reward payments were made prior to the discovery of Nora’s body, and noted that a police hotline remains open for those with information on the case.
After meeting Malaysia’s deputy prime minister on Friday, her family said they are “struggling to understand the events of the last 10 days”.
The statement, issued on their behalf by LBT, added: “The initial postmortem results have given some information that helps us to understand Nora’s cause of death.
“But our beautiful innocent girl died in extremely complex circumstances and we are hoping that soon we will have more answers to our many questions.”
Malaysian police said Nora is likely to have spent a week in the jungle on her own.
(PA Graphics)
The London teenager, who was born with the brain defect holoprosencephaly and was described by her family as “vulnerable”, went missing from the resort of Dusun on Sunday August 4.
The 15-year-old had died between two and four days before her body was discovered, a postmortem examination revealed.
The family said they will be bringing Nora’s body home “where she will finally be laid to rest, close to her loving families in France and Ireland”.
They also thanked Malaysian authorities and search parties for their efforts locating the teenager.
“Tragically, as we know, this wasn’t enough to save Nora,” they said.
Meabh and Sebastien Quoirin (Royal Malaysia Police/AP)
Nora lived in London and was the daughter of French-Irish parents Sebastien and Meabh Quoirin.
Negeri Sembilan state police chief Mohamad Mat Yusop said on Thursday that the postmortem examination had found no evidence that the teenager had been abducted or raped.
He said she had died between two and four days previously, from intestinal bleeding, most likely due to starvation and stress.
He added: “The cause of death was upper gastrointestinal bleeding due to duodenal ulcer, complicated with perforation … it could be due to a lack of food for a long period of time and due to prolonged stress.”
He said there were some bruises on her legs but these would not have caused her death.
Further analysis is due on samples taken from her body, he added.
In Saturday’s statement, the Quoirin family said ongoing investigations would continue in France as is standard practice for overseas cases involving French citizens.
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