Kelly Denman: Mystery over university beauty who plunged to her death in Italy

Mike Gallagher

Aug 15, 2011 - 14:29

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Kelly Denman: Mystery over university beauty who plunged to her death in Italy

Bright: University of Washington Kelly Denman, 20, was travelling abroad in Italy when she mysteriously died at the weekend

A young American tourist has fallen to her death from a window overlooking rock cliffs in the Italian Riviera, police said today.

The tourist, identified as 20-year-old Kelly Rose Denman of Colorado, apparently fell out of a window of the room where she was staying in the Cinque Terre region of northweste Italy early Saturday moing, said police commander Francesco Villa in the town of Veazza.

Miss Denman had last been seen by a friend when they retued to the room from a night out. Mr Villa said they had been drinking, and the friend was already asleep when Miss Denman apparently perched on the window sill from which she fell.

The scene: Early reports indicate she fell to her death while travelling with friends in Veazza, Italy - a town squeezed between cliffs above the Mediterranean

The cause of death was drowning after falling 80ft down a rocky cliff, Mr Villa said.

The Denver native and Delta Gamma sorority member was travelling Europe with two college friends, and the group had planned to leave for Genoa on Sunday moing en route to Spain.

According to SeattlePI.com, Miss Denman was seen leaving her lodgings at around 4am in the early hours of Sunday moing.

When she was not seen in her room later that day her friends called her cellphone but it no longer worked. After searching on their own, they called police at 10am.

University of Washington Kelly Denman was tall, slender and very beautiful, says the Italian press, just another American student

Zest: Miss Denman's Twitter profile read 'die living' and she often wrote about her love of travel

Final messages: Miss Denman posted this picture from her room in Veazza from which she fell just three days before her body was discovered in the Mediterranean

The search came to an end when two local boys found Miss Denman's body in the Mediterranean at approximately 2pm, off the coast of a beach that can be accessed only by boat.

Miss Denman's love for travel and adventure was apparent on her Twitter profile, which, next to a picture of her smiling brightly read: 'die living.'

On August 11, just three days before her body was found, she posted a tweet that read: 'View from the room in Veazza!'

Accompanying the message was a cryptic, foreshadowing picture of the window from which she would fall, waves rolling below.

Miss Denman planned to spend her junior year in college studying abroad.