A military search party assisted by L.A. Sheriff’s deputies is looking for the body of a U.S. Army soldier who vanished from an airport hotel while vacationing with her boyfriend—who has confessed to killing her but refuses to pinpoint to investigators where he dumped her remains, law enforcement officials tell L.A. Mag.
Anna Laura Costa Porsborg, 22, is a Brazilian national who came to the U.S. five years ago from the state of Para, near the Amazonia National Park, to join the Army. She told her family she was going to travel from her Virginia base to celebrate her birthday and sightsee around L.A. with her boyfriend, Luis Antonio Gomes Akay, who is also from Brazil. Costa’s loved ones last heard from her on December 27, the day Akay phoned to say she had left their hotel room at the Double Tree Hotel near LAX after the couple ended the relationship.
Suspicious of Akay’s story and not able to reach her daughter, Costa’s mother reported her disappearance to the Brazilian Federal Police, who called the FBI’s L.A. field office. The FBI confirmed it assisted the L.A. County Sheriff’s Department and referred questions to the sheriff’s department. Akay later confessed to killing Costa because she wanted to end their short engagement, but has refused to tell investigators where he left her body other than to say it was in “a mountainous area.”
Akay was taken into custody on Jan. 4 by the LASD and El Segundo Police on a murder charge. District Attorney George Gascon’s office declined to provide details of Akay’s arrest or confession, other than to say that the suspect “has not been assigned an attorney.”
An LASD spokesperson would only say that Akay has been arrested and a murder charge was filed.
But Jorge Fercuri of the L.A. Consulate General of Brazil told LAMag that the embassy is working to assist the young soldier’s family in returning her remains to the country once she is found.
Akay referenced a mountainous area, but the widespread flooding over the past several days slowed the search. Sources tell LAMag that the search resumed on Thursday. Federal Police in Brazil told reporters in a statement that Akay told the FBI he killed Costa but is refusing to tell them where she is “in the hope of not being convicted.”
The murder of the soldier has made national headlines in Brazil and has been widely discussed on TikTok, where her friends are pleading for justice. Costa’s family has also told reporters in that country that they are in touch with the family of another woman who vanished after ending a four-month relationship with Akay in Brazil.
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