When, on Saturday, February 16, 2019, Katarina Srnec’s future son-in-law called police to the Srnec family home in Palovec (north of Čakovec), he expected nothing more than an explanation for unusually high electricity bills. Instead of a malfunction, however, in an old chest freezer beneath the stairs he uncovered the remains of 23-year-old Jasmina Dominić, missing since the summer of 2000. Police recovered the body after a full 18 years—and all of Croatia was left in shock. (www.ndtv.com)
How a Promising Economics Student Disappeared
Jasmina, an economics student in Zagreb, planned to move abroad after graduation. But she spent her last holiday at home with her older sister Smiljana and Smiljana’s infant daughter. By then, tension between the sisters had already taken hold: Smiljana struggled with gambling, the family lived off money their mother earned in Germany, and Jasmina refused to “enable” her sister’s addiction. In the summer of 2000, she therefore left home—at least, that was the official version Smiljana repeated to relatives and police alike.
According to her, Jasmina was supposedly living in France, and later allegedly working on a cruise ship. Years later their mother discovered Jasmina’s passport and mobile phone and, in 2005, finally reported her missing. But the police search stalled—the only person who claimed she had been “speaking with her sister by phone” was Smiljana herself.
The Freezer No One Opened
Relatives recall that the freezer under the stairs had once been used for rabbit meat; after 2000, however, it remained locked. When David—the fiancé of Katarina’s eldest daughter—opened it, he covered his nose: frozen hair protruded from a plastic bag. The responding officers sealed the house and escorted four family members out.
Detectives soon found a series of smeared fingerprints on the layers of plastic. They belonged to Smiljana Srnec, born in 1974. While being escorted for questioning, she reportedly whispered a confession: “She’s dead, I did it.” At the station, however, after consulting her husband—a lawyer—she withdrew her statement.
Motive: Money, Jealousy, and Years of Anger
The autopsy showed five blows from a blunt object to the crown of the head, the body’s placement in the freezer around the summer of 2000, and at least two layers of protective gloves—one of which later tore and left the fingerprints mentioned above. Psychologists in the trial pointed to long-standing rivalry between the sisters, their father’s alcohol-fueled aggression, and Smiljana’s pathological obsession with slot machines.
A Trial Watched by All of Croatia
In addition to biological evidence, the prosecution also brought before the jury testimony from neighbors who, for years, had heard arguments and seen bruises on Smiljana’s fists. In June 2020, the county court in Varaždin found the defendant guilty of premeditated murder and sentenced her to 15 years in prison under heightened security—the harshest penalty still permitted under the 1997 Criminal Code in force at the time of the crime. (AP News)
Smiljana appealed repeatedly, but the Supreme Court upheld the verdict. Since July 2021, she has been serving her sentence at the women’s prison in Požega. Jasmina was buried with full honors nearly twenty years after the tragedy, in the cemetery of her home village.
An Unwanted Legacy for Police
The case sparked debate about how it was possible for the body to remain undiscovered despite an official search. Croatia’s Ministry of the Interior subsequently tightened internal procedures for checking private homes and, in 2024, backed an initiative for a regional missing-persons database for the former Yugoslavia, combining police and forensic records into a single interactive platform.
Similar Chilling Cases: From Houston to Zagreb
This is not the first time a crime has been “preserved” for good in a refrigeration unit. In Texas, the so-called Icebox Murders shocked the public in 1965: police found the bodies of Fred and Edwina Rogers dismembered and stored in their refrigerator; the main suspect was their son Charles, who disappeared without a trace and has never been found. (People.com)
Croatia itself has another bizarre chapter: in 2008, officials unlocked an apartment in Zagreb and found Hedviga Golik dead—she had been sitting by a switched-on television for 42 years, and, covered in dust, became a symbol of so-called “hidden deaths” among isolated city dwellers. (Wikipedia)
Video on the Topic
A complete English summary of the case (True Crime review):
Sources
- Associated Press: Croatian woman convicted of hiding sister’s body in freezer
- NDTV / AFP: Woman’s Body Found in Freezer 18 Years After She Went Missing in Croatia
- PEOPLE Magazine: Fridge Full of Horror: Couple Was Dismembered in Icebox Murders…
Robert
I’m interested in technology and history, especially true crime stories. For three years I ran a fact-based portal about modern history, and for a year I co-built a blogging platform where I published dozens of analytical articles. I founded offpitch so that quality content wouldn’t be hidden behind a paywall.
