Ex-Penthouse model’s death baffling, cops say, Police baffled by mystery death of Caligula actress found naked and washed up on beach with broken neck
- Questions over death of Anneka Vasta, who appeared in infamous soft-porn movie Caligula in 1979 and was former Penthouse Pet of the Year
- Naked body discovered on San Diego beach with suspicions of foul play
- Her sisters firmly refute suggestions she committed suicide
- Vasta was awarded $4million in damages in 1990 after sexual harassment from Penthouse publisher Bob Guccione
Navy investigators are asking for public help as they probe the death of a former Penthouse model and Caligula actress whose body washed up in San Diego County.
Authorities want to know whether anyone saw Anneka Vasta before joggers found her naked body on a Marine training beach at Camp Pendleton on January 4 this year.
The 58-year-old was discovered with a broken neck and back. She had drowned. Police are trying to establish how she got there and whether her death was a suicide.
Former centre-fold Vasta lived a life of relative glamour in the 1970s and 80s, being named the 1975 Penthouse Pet of the Year, under the name Anneka Di Lorenzo, and appearing in Bob Guccione's infamous soft-porn film Caligula.
She later won $4million in a landmark sexual harassment suit against Penthouse publisher Guccione, whom she had dated, after he compelled her to have sex with two of his business associates.
The Naval Criminal Investigative Service is asking if anyone recalls seeing Vasta along Interstate 5, where her car was found parked at a popular scenic overlook, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.
Federal agents have pursued the case for nine months but are not yet able to say how Vasta got from the vantage point 60ft above sea level, to the rocky sand below, more than a mile south.
Investigators believe that if Vasta jumped from the bluffs below her car, her body would not have hit the water, because the tide is not high enough at the location, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.
Her family strongly refutes the suggestion she committed suicide and investigators have looked into whether Vasta, known as emotionally fragile, was harmed by someone she met that New Year's Eve weekend.
'The main unanswered question that we have is how she got from her vehicle to the water,' Special Agent Rachel McGranaghan told the San Diego Union-Tribune, one of two naval investigators leading the case.
'We know her life ended in the water, in some circumstance, we just don’t know how.'
Divorced and in and out of jobs, Vasta, who was born Marjorie Lee Thoreson in St Paul, Minnesota, had been living near her sister Susan Thoreson in Sherman Oaks, Los Angeles.
Ms Thoreson said her sister began showing signs of mental problems about six or eight years ago, suffering bouts of paranoia and anxiety, the San Diego Union-Tribune.
The former Penthouse model is believed to have left Los Angeles in the early hours of January 2 and driven south in a maroon 2001 Mazda 626 sedan, with many of her possessions packed in the trunk, the paper said.
Just before 6am, she rented a room at the Motel 6 on Raintree Drive, near South Carlsbad State Beach but never checked out.
She drove around until 8.30am, making calls to family and friends, the last of which was from a the vicinity of where she parked her car. What happened after that is a mystery.
When investigators discovered the Mazda, her phone and purse were still in it, as well as a blood-stained leopard-print blouse and a sports bra, which was wrapped in a plastic bag from the Motel 6, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.
A steak knife with Vasta's blood on it was found by the passenger floorboard. Lithium and an empty bottle of Xanax were found in the car but an autopsy showed no drugs in the dead woman's body.
The medical examiner reported shallow cuts on Vasta's wrists, consistent with a half-hearted suicide attempt. She also had two stab wounds on her chest, the San Diego Union-Tribune reported.
Susan Thoreson and Vasta's two other sisters, are convinced their sibling would not have killed herself and are troubled by the fact her neck and back were broken while she was still alive.
They point to the fact she spoke daily with her daughter, who attends Florida State University, and say she still had plenty to live for.
Her family believe Vasta's open nature could have led her into trouble.
'She's like a little girl out in the street. A stranger could walk by, and she’ll pick up a conversation with them,' Ms Thoreson told the San Diego Union-Tribune.
Vasta played Messalina, a Roman empress, in Caligula, which was the first major movie to feature eminent film actors, including Helen Mirren, in explicit sex scenes. Anneka Vasta, NCIS Vasta, +camp pendleton, Calif., Caligula., Marjorie Lee Thoreson $4 million,
In 1990 she won a ground-breaking victory over Guccione for sexual harassment. A New York judge awarded her more than $4 million, though on appeal the damages were determined to be non-recoverable and the court vacated the award.
Source:dailymail
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