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ARGENTINA | 28-02-2019 16:35

Lawyer claims Natacha Jaitt was murdered to stop her speaking out

In 2018, Jaitt made explosive allegations that dozens of high-profile sports and entertainment personalities were involved in an underage prostitution ring.

Entertainer Natacha Jaitt was about to go public with damaging information about the ties to child prostitution of Argentina's rich and famous, her lawyer said Thursday.

Jaitt was found dead at a private events facility in the Tigre district, north of Buenos Aires City, on Saturday, prompting a wave of conspiracy theories suggesting the media personality was in fact murdered.

"I do not believe that it (her supposed murder) was because of previous accusations she made. I believe it is because she wanted to reveal something else, something new", lawyer Alejandro Cipolla told the Todas las tardes lifestyle programme. Jaitt's brother Ulises is standing by a similar hypothesis, according to statements made to various media during the week.

Cipolla again insisted that investigators should not rule out the possibility that Jaitt's producer and friend Raúl Velaztiqui was involved in the supposed murder. 

Velaztiqui led Jaitt to the Xanadú events facility in Tigre to discuss a business deal with its owner Gonzalo Rigoni.

Velaztiqui was arrested Wednesday for giving alleged "false testimony" to police about the circumstances surrounding Jaitt's death.

Velaztiqui's arrest "changes the outlook" of the investigation, Cipolla told reporters, since authorities can no longer "deny the possibility of an anterior motive" on the part of Velaztiqui, who is believed to have lied about a number of details including having hidden Jaitt's phone.

Jaitt, a well-known media personality, previously worked as a model, actress, escort, and TV and radio presenter. 

Known to have formerly been a drug user, those closest to her insisted that – despite recent media reports about the circumstances surrounding her death – Jaitt was no longer consuming drugs.

MURDER?

In 2018, Jaitt had made explosive allegations that dozens of high-profile sports and entertainment personalities were involved in an underage prostitution ring. Indicating she feared for her safety, she once went as far as to warn via Twitter that she could pay the ultimate price for revealing dirty information she had on some of the country's rich and famous.

"WARNING: I am not going to commit suicide, I am not going to take too much cocaine and drown in a bath, or shoot myself. So if this happens, it wasn't me. Save this Tweet," she wrote in April, 2018.

Jaitt had made a series of tweets and television appearances, just days after explosive allegations in April 2018 about child prostitution at major Argentine football clubs, including Independiente and River Plate. 

While many former club officials' cases remain before the courts, the scandal spent barely weeks in the news headlines in Argentina.

Jaitt was survived by two children and a brother.

-TIMES/EXITOINA

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