A local model was videotaped binge drinking before she was killed when her car plunged into the North Branch of the Chicago River, a city source said Friday.
The disclosure comes after Irma Sabanovic’s family filed a lawsuit against the city saying warning signs and better barricades could have prevented the accident.
Sabanovic, a 25-year-old model and college student, was last seen alive May 12 as she headed from Chuckie’s bar in Rogers Park to the Exit nightclub near North and Elston avenues.
At 2 a.m., she sent a text message to a friend saying she was lost.
Her car was pulled out of the water Sunday after it was discovered by the police marine unit. The blue Ford Focus was in the Chicago River where Blackhawk Street dead-ends on the east bank — just a few blocks south of the Exit nightclub.
A city source said a video taken at Chuckie’s showed Sabanovic drinking seven or eight beers and nine shots of liquor over a period of about 1 ½ hours. Another video showed her car traveling at a “high rate of speed” before striking trees and flipping upside down into the river, the source said.
But Ian R. Alexander, the attorney for her family, said he spoke to bartenders at Chuckie’s — where Sabanovic had worked —and they said she didn’t drink nearly that much alcohol that night.
“This is the city trying to muddy the waters,” Alexander said.
He said he’s waiting for autopsy results that may show what Sabanovic’s blood-alcohol content was when she died. The main issue, though, isn’t whether Sabanovic was drunk but why the city didn’t place a barricade and signs at the end of the street, Alexander said. He pointed out that Richard Roman, a 26-year-old aspiring actor and cabbie, was killed in 1992 when he drove his taxi off Blackhawk Street and into the river on the opposite bank. His family received a $500,000 legal settlement from the city, which installed concrete barriers and a stop sign there.
“The city made the same mistake twice, and two people died who shouldn’t have died,” Alexander said.
Anguished family members of Sabanovic — a Bosnian immigrant living in West Rogers Park — are left to fret over her last minutes, Alexander said.
“I don’t know if she was unconscious when she was in the water — we just don’t know what happened,” Alexander said. “So you can’t open the door, the car is filling up with water. This poor girl, the car is filling with water, and she’s thinking she’s going to suffer the worst death possible.”
In a statement, the city denied the claim that the street was “inherently dangerous.” It was well-lit; there was a “no outlet” sign prominently displayed at the entrance to the street; and there was an 8-inch curb at the end of the street, which is four times higher than the average city curb, the statement said.
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UPDATE: Det. SLC is betting this missing model was texting when she flew her car into the Chicago River....
UPDATE: Barriers erected at scene of fatal river crash
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Watch for a multi-million dollar lawsuit against the city of Chicago for "failing to protect this end of the road". Cops find missing model’s car in Chicago River with body inside
The hopes of finding missing model Irma Sabanovic, who was last heard from more than a week ago, were dashed after crews pulled Sabanovic’s car out of the Chicago River with a body inside.
They organized a search party Saturday hoping to find missing model Irma Sabanovic, who was last heard from more than a week ago after getting lost on her way to a Near West Side nightclub.
By Saturday afternoon, the hopes of the friends and fellow Bosnians who had gathered to look for her were dashed after crews pulled Sabanovic’s car out of the Chicago River with a female body inside.
The body had not been positively identified by the Cook County Medical Examiner’s office as of Saturday evening. But a Chicago Police department spokesman confirmed that the license plate of the blue Ford Focus pulled from the river matched that of Sabanovic’s car.
“We were hoping to find a better result than we found today,” said Evelina Mehanovic, who had attended Mather High School with Sabanovic and created a “Help Us Find Irma” Facebook page that raised just under $15,000 in donations.
“I’m very sad and very confused,” Mehanovic said, adding that money raised through the site would now be put in a fund for the family to pay for funeral expenses.
Authorities pulled the car out of the North Branch of the Chicago River near Elston and Blackhawk at 3:30 p.m.
According to police, the car was discovered after the Chicago Police Marine Unit picked up a sonar signal indicating there was an object in the water at that location.
Sabanovic, 25, lived in Rogers Park with her father. She left her home in the 1900 block of West Hood on May 12 with the intention of going to the Exit nightclub near Elston and North, according to a police alert issued after she went missing. At 2 a.m., she sent a text message to a male friend saying she was lost near Milwaukee and Erie.
That was the last communication from her.
Sabanovic, who modeled under the name Ira Blackbird, had emigrated to Chicago in 2000 with both parents after the Bosnian civil war. Her mother recently died of cancer.
She has two other sisters still in Bosnia, and she had been a student at Northeastern Illinois University and Wright Junior College, friends said.
“It’s the first time anything like this has happened to any one of us who came here after the war. It’s very sad,” said another woman at the scene, Safa Sabanovic (no relation), who didn’t know the missing woman but had helped in the search. “We all are lost and don’t know what went down.”
Clem Jaskot, a friend of Irma Sabanovic’s family, questioned why there was only a short curb at the end of Blackhawk and not a more substantial barrier to prevent vehicles from plunging into the river.
“Why were there no guard rails?” he said. “She ended up in the river because there was nothing to stop her. … It’s tragic.”
Jaskot said Sabanovic’s father had recently purchased a plane ticket for Irma to travel to Bosnia to visit her sisters.
“He’s obviously very upset right now,” Jaskot said. “To lose your wife and daughter in the span of less than two years is unbelievable.”
