Missing woman declared a Sept. 11 victim (World Trade Center)
On the night before the Sept. 11 attack, Dr. Sneha Anne Philip bought three pairs of shoes, bed linens and lingerie at a department store across the street from the World Trade Center. She was never heard from again.
Her loved ones feared she had been kidnapped or murdered by a stranger. Investigators at first thought that she may have orchestrated her disappearance to get away from a troubled marriage, fights about her suspected affairs with other women and a drinking problem that threatened her job.
But eventually her family became convinced she had gone to the trade center on Sept. 11 — perhaps to help victims — and had died there.
And on Thursday, more than six years after the attack, an appeals court finally agreed, asking that Philip’s name be added to the official list of Sept. 11 victims.
“As a family, we were obviously hopeful that, `OK, she’s still alive,’ in the beginning,” her brother, Ashwin Philips, said Friday. “Obviously as time goes on, you realize, `OK, this is what happened.’ She lived two blocks from the World Trade Center.’”
Her husband, Ron Lieberman, who had gone to court to secure a place for his wife on the Sept. 11 memorial, does not plan to sue over her death, said his lawyer, Marc Bogatin. And it is too late for him to collect anything from the federal Sept. 11 Victims Compensation Fund, which went out of business in 2003.
The case has been shrouded in mystery ever since the fires were raging at ground zero.
Philip’s family attended ceremonies at ground zero over the years and buried an urn filled with trade center ashes in her memory near her parents’ home.
“This is the most commonsense thing that happened to her,” said her 39-year-old brother. “It’s not that we have 100 percent proof. With all the information that we have, this is the most likely explanation.”