WEST HOLLYWOOD, Calif. — A white Mercedes-Benz found in a parking lot in West Hollywood belonged to an ex-model whose brutal slaying prompted an international manhunt for a former reality-TV contestant wanted in the murder, police said Wednesday.
Police received an anonymous telephone tip and found the car belonging to 28-year-old Jasmine Fiore in a parking lot next to a grocery store, Buena Park police Detective Eric Burciaga said.
Police have not found a murder scene and say Fiore could have been killed in the car before her nude body was found stuffed into a suitcase in a Southern California trash bin Aug. 15.
Investigators did not attempt to open the car and were not able to see inside because of its tinted windows. A tow truck transported it from the scene.
The examination of the car “could take quite awhile because they’re going to be very methodical going through it,” said Tom Hession, chief inspector for the regional fugitive task force of the U.S. Marshals Service.
A witness told police the car had been parked in the lot since the day of the killing.
Fiore’s fingers and teeth had been removed when her body was found, presumably to hamper efforts to identify her. Police learned her identity by tracing the serial number on her breast implants.
Suspect Ryan Jenkins, 32, her ex-husband and a former contestant on the VH1 show “Megan Wants a Millionaire,” was found hanging from a clothes rack in a hotel room in Hope, British Columbia, on Sunday after a frantic dash to the border. An autopsy concluded he committed suicide.
In Canada, authorities said a silver PT Cruiser matching the description of the vehicle seen dropping Jenkins at a motel was parked at his half-sister’s condominium in Vancouver.
A message left with a woman answering Alena Jenkins’ phone was not immediately returned. Police have identified the woman who helped Jenkins check into the motel but have not released her name. She was not in custody, and police were considering whether she would face charges.
Jenkins left a real-estate job in his native Calgary, Alberta, earlier this year to pursue a Hollywood career and found some success. He was among a group of wealthy young men on the reality show who tried to win over a materialistic blond.
