An eyewitness spoke with Nikoline Piwoni Høie (17) and another girl a short distance from the Funky Buddha nightclub. At the time, the teenagers were talking to four foreign men in a white car.
The young woman Document has spoken to is Danish and lives permanently in Puerto Banús, Spain. She is in her late twenties and lives on the same street where Nikoline’s mobile phone was located when it went dead.
Near her apartment is a petrol station, where the woman spoke with the two teenagers at around 02:50 on Monday, 6 July.
Shortly beforehand, she had recorded several voice messages on the WhatsApp messaging service, which she sent to a friend to document men in the street who were trying to hit on her.
According to her, it is something she, as a Scandinavian woman with blonde hair, has to deal with every day.
“Many react really nastily to being rejected,” she says.
It was during this late-night walk to buy ice cream that she met Nikoline.
This happened approximately 40 minutes before the 17-year-old from Arendal disappeared from her friend’s sight. The friend has explained that she went to the nightclub toilet and never found Nikoline again afterwards.
It also happened 40 minutes before Nikoline’s mobile phone went offline and stopped registering GPS positions.
The question now is whether it is true that Nikoline returned to the nightclub after the trip to the petrol station, around 400 metres away.
Document’s source is certain of the timing because of the timestamp on the messages she sent to her friend just minutes earlier.
– Talking to some older guys in a car
“Nikoline was with a dark-haired girl. She was also wearing a dress. I didn’t know either of them. But Nikoline reminded me very much of myself when I was younger. That was why, when I saw her standing and talking to some slightly older guys in a car, I took hold of them and pulled them aside. I warned them that this was not something girls do down here.
She says the girls did not appear to be drunk. They were in good spirits.
“I said it in English because I didn’t know where they were from. Nikoline was more reserved than the dark-haired girl, who did most of the talking. She spoke good English. I told them they could be certain these were not good guys,” the Danish woman says.
“But I couldn’t stop them. They went back to the car to talk to the men again.”
The four men in the car were very pushy, the woman says. It was a small white car, probably a Renault.
“The men seemed desperate to make contact with the girls. I imagine perhaps two of them suggested going somewhere else. They were maybe around 25 years old and darker-skinned than typical Spanish men. So perhaps they were from Morocco.”
She emphasises that she cannot know whether these men had anything to do with what happened later that night.
According to the Guardia Civil, Nikoline took an Uber towards Fuengirola at around 04:00 together with two men. It is unknown whether those two were the same as any of the men in the white car.
Document’s source points to a scooter at the petrol station, at the spot where she spoke with Nikoline Piwoni Høie and a dark-haired girl shortly before the two became separated. (Photo: Video still/private)
After the conversation at the petrol station, the eyewitness went home.
“I still feel bad about what happened and often think about whether I could have done more to stop the girls. Every time I go out, I am reminded of the incident.
She takes comfort in the fact that the police have said they know much more than they have made public and that the public will learn more before the end of the week.
“Nikoline’s phone was still on the street where I live when it stopped working. When I heard the following morning that she had been reported missing, I immediately went and showed photographs of her in kiosks and shops that stay open late. The security staff in my apartment building thought it could not be anything serious because the police had not asked them for surveillance footage.”
– Relaxed, happy, naïve
The missing-person notice issued by the family when she failed to return home on Monday, 6 July, states that Nikoline was wearing a long pink dress with an Arabic pattern. This photograph is said to have been taken that evening at the nightclub in Puerto Banús. (Photo: Private)
“I am certain that she [Nikoline] did not take drugs deliberately. She was not that type of person. She seemed relaxed, not forward. The girl with the dark hair was more pushy and clearly wanted to secure the boys’ contact details.
Nevertheless, it was obvious that both teenagers were interested in the men in the car.
“They seemed so happy and naïve, as so many young girls are when they become captivated by this place. I assume Nikoline grew up somewhere safe and did not know that the world could be as chaotic as it is down here. If men here see that you are blonde and come from Scandinavia, they do not leave you alone.”
At the same time, she blames adults who allow young girls to be out at night in an environment such as Puerto Banús, with its extensive drug use, prostitution and violence.
– The police must do more
The Danish woman says the Spanish police did not take her very seriously at first.
“They didn’t really listen to me. But I was obviously right about what I said, so in the end they wrote down my statement and gave me a direct number to call. They have also had many police patrols on this street over the past few days.
She is worried that she will encounter the four men in the car again. She says she has the impression that the police did more when she lost her dog than they have done in Nikoline’s case.
She is critical of how much time they have spent. Although, according to her, the police have done much recently to make Puerto Banús safer, including stopping and searching cars, she believes far more must be done to tackle mafia activity and other crime.
The source wishes to remain anonymous, but Document knows her identity.