A missing student’s Venmo payments have revealed her final movements before she vanished from a resort in the Dominican Republic.
Sudiksha Konanki, 20, made two payments to an unspecified user on the app on March 5 – hours before she disappeared from the five-star Riu Republica hotel in Punta Cana.
The first transaction was made at 2.54pm to an unnamed ‘new user,’ and Konanki used a sailboat emoji to describe it.
The second was made at 3:38pm and the description was Coco Bongo, which is a renowned nightclub in Punta Cana, as reported by The US Sun. It was to Ananya Chilakamarri, one of the students on the trip, who is not believed to be involved in Konanki’s disappearance.
Investigators continue to search for the the University of Pittsburgh student from Virginia who vanished while visiting the Caribbean with five other people during spring break from classes.
The American man who last seen with her reportedly claims he saved her from drowning after they kissed in the water at the beach.
Former high school wrestling champ Joshua Riibe has not been named a suspect or a person of interest in the case, and is legally free to fly back to the US whenever he wants.
Konanki’s week-long disappearance has baffled officials and prompted cries from her parents to widen the frantic search for the pre-med student.
The complete transcript from Riibe’s police interview has now emerged, detailing his final moments with Konanki and the chaotic aftermath to her mystery disappearance.
Sudiksha Konanki, 20, disappeared from a five-star resort in Punta Cana on Thursday while on Spring Break from the University of Pittsburgh
The missing student made two payments on Venmo just hours before she vanished
Surveillance video footage obtained by Dominican Republic news outlet Noticias SIN showed Joshua Riibe (left) and Sudiksha Konanki (second from left) following their friends to the beach at the Riu Republica Hotel before Konanki disappeared March 6
But he refused to answer several critical questions, remaining silent when cops asked if Konanki could swim, if she cried for help and what he confided in friend after the tragic night.
Riibe, a senior at St. Cloud State University in Minnesota, claimed he had only just met the young woman when they decided to head to the beach, according to the transcript of his interview obtained by Noticias SIN.
He revealed they had kissed in the ocean before they almost got swept away by a wave. He said he saved her from drowning while almost losing consciousness.
‘We were in waist-deep water. We talked and kissed a bit,’ Riibe said. ‘A big wave came and hit us both. And when the water returned, it swept us out to sea. As soon as we were able to surface, we tried to call for help.’
He explained that he previously worked as a lifeguard at a swimming pool and tried to bring them both to safety when he started to feel sick.
‘I was getting tired. I realized she was getting tired of swimming too. I’ve been a lifeguard. I grabbed her and pulled her out. I held her under my arm and swam to get her out of the water,’ Riibe said.
‘It took me a long time to get her out. It was difficult. I was a lifeguard in a pool, not at sea. I was trying to get her to breathe the whole time. That didn’t let me breathe the whole time and I swallowed a lot of water. I could have lost consciousness several times.’
The mystery hunk seen with his arm draped around missing spring breaker Sudiksha Konanki on the morning she vanished has been named by police sources as Joshua Steven Riibe
The 24-year-old said he was able to make it to shore, but claims Sudiksha was still wading in the water when he last saw her.
‘When I finally reached the ground on the beach, I held her in front of me. She wasn’t out of the water, she was knee-deep and walking at an angle out the water,’ he said.
‘The last time I saw her, I asked if she was okay. I didn’t hear her reply because I started vomiting all the water I had swallowed. After vomiting, I looked around. I didn’t see anyone. I thought she had grabbed her things and left.’
He told investigators that he then passed out on the beach and did not hearing anything about Sudiksha until the next day when her friends texted his friend.
‘I felt really bad and tired. I laid down on a beach chair. I fell asleep because I couldn’t go far,’ Riibe said.
‘Then I woke up because of the sun and because mosquitoes were biting me. I went to my friend’s room to get my phone and then went back to my room to sleep.’
Riibe’s distraught family said the former high school athlete ‘wouldn’t hurt a fly.
Josh and his dad, who flew in this week to support his son, have also been in communication with Sudiksha’s distraught Indian immigrant parents Subbarayudu and Sreedevi, DailyMail.com previously revealed.
Riibe was seen on hotel CCTV with his arm draped around Sudiksha as they headed to the resort’s beach around 4am last Thursday.
Joshua Riibe was seen talking to law enforcement at beach next to the Riu Republica Hotel in Punta Cana, Dominican Republic on Monday
The cameras spotted him walking back alone at 9.55am. Sudiksha’s pals reported her missing at around 4pm.
The ‘adults only’ Riu Republica was still teeming with cops, soldiers and officials Thursday as the hunt for pre-med student Sudiksha entered a second week.
Drones, divers, sniffer dogs and hundreds of officers have been deployed in one of the biggest searches in the history of the Dominican Republic, assisted by the FBI and Interpol, which issued a ‘yellow notice’ – a global missing person alert – for the Chantilly, Virginia resident.
Government officials revealed Thursday that the search will carry on at full intensity through at least Sunday, according to Noticias SIN.
Searches are typically stood down after ten days but it could last for as long as six months in a scaled down capacity, the Dominican outlet reported.
