Dacera was 'excited to wear that uniform'. Photo / Supplied, Instagram @xtinedacera
Dacera was 'excited to wear that uniform'. Photo / Supplied, Instagram @xtinedacera
The mother of flight attendant Christine Dacera, who died after a New Year's party in a Philippines hotel, has hit out at the official autopsy finding that her daughter died of a "ruptured aortic aneurysm".
Sharon Dacera appeared on a televised interview and quashed the suggestion her daughter died of an aortic complication and that she "will not accept" the autopsy that's been released.
"For me, my daughter was raped," Mrs Dacera said in an interview with the news program Headstart.
"If you see the body of Christine, if you are the mother you will surely feel the pain suffered by Christine from them but my daughter cannot speak anymore because she died.
"There were lacerations on my daughter, bruises, how come it wasn't written (in the autopsy)? I cannot accept the autopsy that they had done."
'First Christmas away from home'. Photo / Supplied, Instagram @xtinedacera
Christine Dacera was found dead in a hotel room bathtub at the Garden City Grand Hotel in Makati, Philippines on New Year's Day.
Eleven men have been provisionally charged in relation to the rape and murder of the 23-year-old, who worked as a PAL Express crew member. Three of the 11 men charged in relation to Ms Dacera's death have been arrested but released from police custody.
The Makati City Prosecutor's Office said "the pieces of evidence so far submitted are insufficient to establish that (Ms Dacera) was sexually assaulted or raped".
Following the release of the autopsy, the Dacera family is calling for the Philippine National Police's medico-legal officer to be sacked from his position for allegedly bungling the autopsy.
A lawyer for Ms Dacera's family said they believed the young woman was drugged and abused before her death.
Dacera was found dead in her hotel bathtub at the City Garden Grand Hotel in Makati, Philippines. Photo / Supplied
They claimed Ms Dacera "had already experienced intoxication and complained that her drinks appeared to have been spiked" during the New Year's celebrations.
"We also believe that maybe the aneurysm was a proximate cause but it is also very possible it was triggered by the assault prior to her death," the family's lawyer, Brick Reyes, said, according to The Inquirer.
The National Bureau of Investigation is conducting a second autopsy on Ms Dacera's body, and the results are expected to be released sometime this week.
According to local media, the NBI is hopeful it would be able to shed more light on how the young flight attendant died even though her remains were "already contaminated".
Ferdinand Lavin, the NBI's deputy director, said that a re-autopsy may be difficult to establish whether there was sexual abuse before she was found dead in her hotel room because some of the evidence they collected appeared deteriorated and compromised given her body was already embalmed prior to their second autopsy.
"We know that it was quite impossible (to get proper evidence) considering that there have already been some compromises and the body has shown signs of deterioration but we were not discouraged by that," he said in an interview with reporters on Saturday night.
Dacera had recently begun working for PAL as a flight attendant. Photo / Supplied, Instagram @xtinedacera
Justice Secretary Menardo Guevarra said on Tuesday that he had received notification from the NBI that urine samples had been successfully extracted from Ms Dacera's body, which will "provide a lot of information to the forensic team".
"The results of the laboratory examination may come out in a few days," Justice Secretary Guevarra added.
