It appears the devastating death of Zoe Sozo Bethel was an accident after all.
When we first heard about the horrific injuries that hospitalized and ultimately took the life of the reigning Miss Alabama for America Strong, they were presented as accidental. It wasn’t until later that we heard the fall from her balcony was being treated as an attempted suicide.
Sources told DailyMail.com the 27-year-old leapt to her death from her third-story Miami condo. A spokesperson for the Miami Police Department even confirmed the fatal incident was being treated as an attempted suicide, complete with homicide detectives assigned to figure everything out.
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However, according to the latest police reports, obtained by The Sun, the death has been ruled accidental after all. The series of events that led to her loss is as confusing as it is profoundly sad.
According to the documents, Zoe took an unknown narcotic “to relax” while having dinner out with her brother. She told him, per the reports, that it was a “small amount of cannabis” — but that doesn’t seem to be the case.
After dinner, the brother told police, Zoe complained she was “feeling hot” and couldn’t get cool. Back home, she took a shower but it didn’t help, and she still felt too hot. She left her apartment, where witnesses say they saw her acting “erratically” and pacing around. The 27-year-old then reportedly ran to the elevator before her brother came out of the apartment and called for her to come back inside.
That’s when, per the report, she “looked back and took off running full speed straight ahead.” The beauty queen and conservative pundit did NOT jump from the balcony but rather crashed into the rail at full speed, apparently never noticing it. From the report:
“(Her brother) stated that she was not aware of the balcony railing in front of her. The victim’s bottom part of her body hit the railing and she fell over.”
The behavior was labeled as “very strange” but not indicative that Bethel was suicidal or even depressed. Unfortunately this new information makes the case even more confusing. No toxicology report has been released to potentially explain any effect a drug might have had on her. But it seems clear something was going on that we may never understand.
We hope Zoe’s family gets more information — and whatever closure they can after this unimaginable tragedy.
If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255), text “STRENGTH” to the Crisis Text Line at 741-741, or go to suicidepreventionlifeline.org.
[Image via Zoe Sozo Bethel/Instagram.]
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