Federal prosecutors Wednesday indicted Fort Lauderdale businessman David Knezevich of killing his wife Ana Knezevich Henao in Madrid

David Knezevich, 36, and Ana Knezevich Henao, 40, were going through a difficult divorce before she vanished in Madrid

Ana Knezevich Henao who disappeared from her Madrid apartment on February 2, remains missing, presumed dead

Feds have joined efforts with Spanish National Police to produce mountains of circumstantial evidence implicating the suspect, including surveillance footage

Knezevich a Fort Lauderdale businessman from Serbia who has been held at a federal lock-up in Miami since his arrest in May

He faces a potential death penalty or life in prison if convicted of the new charge, kidnapping resulting in death

David Knezevich, [photo], of Fort Lauderdale , Florida, was indicted Wednesday for killing his wife Ana Knezevich Henao. He was already charged in February for kidnapping her in Madrid 

But on Wednesday, federal prosecutors obtained a grand jury indictment accusing David Knezevich of killing Ana Knezevich Henao, in addition to a previous charge of kidnapping her in Madrid in early February.
Serbian transplant David Knezevich, also known as Dusan Knezevic, a 36-year-old a Fort Lauderdale businessman, has been held at a federal lock-up in Miami since his arrest in May.
He faces a potential death penalty or life in prison, if convicted of the new charge, kidnapping resulting in death.
Knezevich was convicted at trial, would face the death penalty at his sentencing, else he faces the maximum sentence of life in prison.

Ana Knezevich Henao, [left], disappearance from her Madrid apartment on Feb. 2. She remains missing, presumed dead. Her estranged husband, David Knezevich, has been indicted on kidnapping and murder

The prosecutors’ decision marks a dramatic shift in the largely circumstantial case surrounding the disappearance of Ana Knezevich Henao. The 40-year-old south Florida resident vanished from her Madrid apartment on Februaryon2.
Before the Colombian-American’s presumed death, the couple was going through a difficult divorce while fighting over millions in Broward properties they acquired during their time as a couple. She moved from Fort Lauderdale to Madrid in December after their 13-year marriage fell apart.
FBI said there is considerable circumstantial evidence suggesting the suspect had the means, opportunity and motive to kidnap his estranged wife from her apartment in Madrid.
Knezevich, who operated a tech business, owned millions of dollars in Broward County residential real estate with his wife, a native of Colombia. They were fighting over these and other assets when she left for Spain in late December 2023. He’s accused of leaving Miami the following month with a plan to track her down. She was reported missing by authorities on Feb. 2.
The FBI believes the husband carried her body in a suitcase out of her Madrid apartment building that evening, citing security-camera footage of him exiting the elevator. In August, the FBI joined Spanish and Italian authorities in a search for her corpse in the woods north of the city of Vicenza in Italy, where a GPS alert onDavid’s rented Peugeot 308 suggested he took a detour there on his return trip from Spain to Serbia.
The FBI suspects Knezevich carried out Ana, a petite woman, in something that looks like a suitcase, according to the agent’s testimony.
Another video showing Knezevich purchasing duct tape and spray paint at a Madrid hardware store, used in wedging the front door of Ana’s apartment building open during the alleged kidnapping. The suspect also hung a coat over the security camera in the lobby, investigators said.

At the time David Knezevich was supposed to be visiting family in Serbia, he is shown in surveillance footage buying duct tae and spray paint at a Madrid hardware store, allegedly used to wedge the front door of the wife’s apt building open during the kidnapping

Knezevich who allegedly traveled from Miami to Serbia before he kidnapped his wife in Spain.
For months, the FBI has been been coordinating its investigation with the Spanish National Police.
The joint task force of investigators said there are pointers to the suspect’s culpability, including suspicious security-camera footage showing David Knezevich in Madrid hardware store, then at his estranged wife’s apartment just before her disappearance.
Furthermore fabricated text messages and stolen license plates on his rental car in Madrid suggest a cover-up. Still, the investigators have not found blood evidence or the signs of a struggle in Ana Knezevich Henao’s Madrid apartment after she was reported missing.
Knezevich who allegedly traveled from Miami to Serbia before he kidnapped his wife in Spain was ordered to remain in jail because he considered him a “serious flight risk.”
After the second hearing, Magistrate Judge Edwin Torres concluded, “Indeed, the evidence produced at the second hearing supports the Court’s original finding that [Knezevich] presents a serious risk of flight given the cunning level of deception that he has demonstrated as part of the crime he is alleged to have engaged in.”

Investigators said David Knezevich is the man seen in this surveillance footage recorded at different locations in Madrid, Spain in February 2024, including the missing woman’s apt, the day she disappeared, where he is seen spraying the lens before hanging a coat over the security camera in the lobby

During the detention hearing, FBI showed also showed another video showing Knezevich purchasing duct tape and spray paint at a Madrid hardware store that may have been used to keep the front door of the wife’s apartment building open during the alleged kidnapping and to coat over the security camera in the lobby.
Knezevich allegedly wrote a series of text messages between him and a Colombian woman who prosecutors claim is his girlfriend. During one exchange, he asked the woman to translate a message into “perfect Colombian” for a friend in Serbia writing a script. Knezevich told the woman he wanted the writing to sound authentic, according to the FBI.
The day after Ana Knezevich disappeared, three friends told investigators they received the same strange message from her, which suggested she was still alive. “I met someone wonderful. He has a summer house about 2h from Madrid. We are going there now and I will spend a few days there. There is barely any signal though. I’ll call you when I come back. Kisses,” was the message on her cellphone.
“He was engaging in a scheme to make it look like the wife was alive and well, communicating with her friends about a man she just met, when in fact she was never to be seen again,” the judge at his preliminary hearing observed.
Prosecutors said “rather than flying directly into Spain, [Knezevich], sought to conceal his travel to Madrid by flying into Istanbul, Turkey, and then driving over 5,000 kilometers through multiple countries to Madrid,” prosecutors said.
The judge further noted that Knezevich flew in January from Miami to Turkey then to Serbia, where he has family, and then rented the Peugeot to drive to Spain. He then drove the rental car from Belgrade to Madrid and back to Belgrade, keeping the car for 47 days. When he returned it to the rental agency, the windows had been tinted, stickers removed and license plates swapped out.
“All these facts in combination reflect highly unusual behavior for someone with the means to fly from Serbia to Spain if he wanted to visit a hardware store in Madrid,” Judge Torres wrote. “At a time he was supposed to be visiting his family in Serbia, he was blocks away from the apartment where his wife was last seen.”
The judge further noted that Knezevich had shown a”cunning level of deception that he has demonstrated as part of the crime he is alleged to have engaged in.”
Barring postponements, trial is in the potential death penalty case, is tentatively scheduled to begin in February 2025.