{"id":409066,"date":"2024-07-03T21:22:39","date_gmt":"2024-07-03T21:22:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=409066"},"modified":"2024-07-03T22:07:02","modified_gmt":"2024-07-03T22:07:02","slug":"former-olympian-world-champion-found-shot-dead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=409066","title":{"rendered":"Former Olympian, world champion found shot dead"},"content":{"rendered":"

South African police have discovered the body of former high jump world champion Jacques Freitag after he went missing last month, local media reported.<\/p>\n

The reports said the 42-year-old, who won the 2003 world title in Paris and competed at the 2004 Olympics<\/a>, had been shot.<\/p>\n

Police said they found the body in a field near a cemetery in the city of Pretoria and are treating the case as murder.<\/p>\n

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Netwerk24 reported a source told the publication that Freitag was allegedly executed.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

One of the gunshot wounds was reportedly located in the back of his skull.<\/p>\n

Freitag's sister, Chrissie Lewis, had appealed for help on social media to find Freitag, who went missing in the predawn hours of June 17 after leaving his mother's house.<\/p>\n

Lewis said he had struggled with drug addiction after his athletics career ended.<\/p>\n

Freitag was reportedly picked up from his mother's home after midnight and dropped at a nearby area by a mystery man who said that he had work for him.<\/p>\n

But he was never seen again until his blood soaked body was found with several bullet wounds.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Freitag was among a select group of athletes to win world titles at youth, junior and senior levels and jumped a personal best of 2.38m in 2005.<\/p>\n

He was one of only 10 athletes including Jamaican sprinters Usain Bolt and Veronica Campbell-Brown to win World Championships at all three levels.<\/p>\n

He won the high jump at the 1999 Youth World Championships in Poland, the Junior World Champs in Chile in 2000 and the Senior's in France in 2003.<\/p>\n

In 2003 he cleared 2.35m at the Stade de France in Paris to win the gold medal at the IAAF World Championships.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

He retired from sport in 2013 and was said to have in recent times been sleeping on the streets or friends' couches, having been unable to hold down a full-time job.<\/p>\n

He still holds the African record after clearing 2.38m, which he set in a competition in 2005.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South African police have discovered the body of former high jump world champion Jacques Freitag after he went missing last month, local media reported. The […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":409068,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409066"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=409066"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409066\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":409073,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/409066\/revisions\/409073"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/409068"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=409066"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=409066"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=409066"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}