The last known person to see California woman Nancy Ng in Guatemala says she has done all she could to help police locate her.
According to ABC 7, public defender Christina Blazek was the last person to see 29-year-old Ng, who vanished on October 19 during a group kayaking trip on Lake Atitlán. She flew to Guatemala on October 14, and within days, the retreat organizer contacted Ng’s father to say she could not be found.
Following her disappearance, Ng’s family has been pushing relentlessly for answers and questioned why Blazek hadn’t reached out to them.
Speaking on her behalf, Blazek’s lawyer, G. Christopher Gardner, said that Blazek has given every bit of information she can to police, despite rumors that she fled Guatemala without speaking to authorities.
Blazek said she saw Ng with a kayak on October 19 and warned her about swimming in the rough waters, but Ng pushed the kayak out further into the lake and went swimming anyway. It’s the last time anyone has seen her.
“My client did not go anywhere with Ng. They happened upon each other on the lake,” Gardner said. “To say my client hasn’t done all she can is not true.”
“She tried to tell her not to swim because it was rough out there and there was a good current.”
Ng’s family said Gardner’s statement is the first time they have heard anything from Blazek, despite pleading with her to provide additional information.
“If it is like she says and it is an accident, I don’t understand how she could choose to leave my family in the dark for almost four weeks, and not just say that from the start,” Ng’s younger sister, Nicky, said.
Gardner said Blazek was shaken by the incident and needed some time to wrap her head around the tragedy.
“They [Ng’s family] tell her they understand she has been through a traumatic experience but then they tell her she needs to come forward to assist authorities…. and they say in the same email if she doesn’t come forward they’ll make her come forward,” Gardner replied.
As CrimeOnline reported, the last known video of Ng showed her waving as she paddled. She was reportedly in a tour group of 10 on Lake Atitlán but disappeared hours after she was seen on video.
“There are people that witnessed what happened, within the group, that haven’t come forward,” Nicky previously told ABC News. “We’re racking our brain as to why they wouldn’t want to come forward and help if nothing nefarious happened.”
Guatemala’s Navy stopped searching for Nancy after 72 hours, prompting the family to hire private search teams that combed through the area. Now, the family is raising money to help cover the costs of those private search efforts, through a GoFundMe page.
Black Wolf Helicopters search team joined in the search, while the FBI and the U.S. Department of State have joined Guatemalan authorities in the investigation
“We’ve searched 99% of the lake — that’s was with helicopters, drones, boat crews,” Black Wolf Helicopters owner Chris Sharpe said earlier this month.
Sharpe told ABC 7 that, for him, the case has become “a criminal investigation because the witnesses who were there at a material time are not being forthcoming.”
Ng, according to family members, is a graduate of California State University (Los Angeles) and works with special needs children at the Alhambra Unified School District in Southern California.
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[Feature Photo: Nancy Ng/Family Handout]
