Tatiana ‘Tania’ Dokhotaru sent the above footage to friends in the days before she was found dead in her Liverpool unit
Disturbing video has emerged of a mother with a black eye in the days before she was found dead inside her high-rise apartment and her boyfriend was charged with assaulting her.
Footage exclusively obtained by Daily Mail Australia shows a teary Tatiana ‘Tania’ Dokhotaru, 34, panning the camera across her face to show friends her swollen and bruised left eye.
The mother sent the clip of her facial injuries to loved ones last week. Just days later, her body was discovered inside her unit in Liverpool, Sydney’s south-west, about 8pm on Saturday.
Her body was found almost 24 hours after she frantically called police alleging her partner Danny Zayat, 28, was ‘bashing’ her.
Zayat has since been charged with more than a dozen domestic-violence related offences which allegedly occurred prior to her death – including choking and breaching an AVO.
He was refused bail at court on Monday. No charges have been laid relating to Ms Dokhotaru’s death and he is assisting detectives with their inquiries.
Daily Mail Australia understands police are investigating the black-eye footage as part of their probe into the circumstances surrounding the lead-up to Ms Dokhotaru’s tragic death.
The clip emerged as cracks emerged in the couple’s friendship circle as they grapple with Ms Dokhotaru’s death and Zayat’s arrest.
Ms Dokhotaru is pictured with her former partner Danny Zayat in early 2021
While Ms Dokhotaru’s friends plead for answers about her final hours, Zayat’s mates have worked to have his social media accounts shutdown in order to ‘protect him’ from seeing reams of comments left on his posts by trolls.
According to a police fact sheet tendered in court, Ms Dokhotaru invited Zayat to her flat, where she lived with their young son, on Friday night – where the couple allegedly began arguing about 11.40pm.
She called triple-zero, but the officers who arrived at the 297-unit complex some three hours later left when they could not pinpoint her apartment in the enormous tower.
Police have stated the call for help did not include her complete address.
She was then found dead on Saturday by officers responding to a second welfare call by a neighbour who heard someone screaming ‘help me!’.
Zayat was arrested at the scene. He later told the police he left the house around midnight Friday following an argument about her taking drugs, but returned the following day when he could not contact her.
A friends of Ms Dokhotaru has told Daily Mail Australia rumours are circulating around their social network that she had been using tramadol – a strong opioid painkiller.
Zayat’s lawyer, high-profile barrister Talal Krayem, declined to comment on whether drug use would form part of the defense’s case when contacted by Daily Mail Australia on Wednesday.
The friend said the family is seeking ‘justice’ for Ms Dokhotaru’s son, who now ‘doesn’t have a mother’.
‘This family needs justice for her poor little boy.
Ms Dokhotaru was found dead inside the Liverpool apartment block on Saturday – almost 24 hours after begging triple-0 for help
One of Zayat’s associates urged his friends to assist in having the concrete business owner’s social media pages shutdown
Meanwhile, tradesman Hakan Wolf, who does work for Zayat’s concreting business, fired up his Instagram account on Wednesday morning to plead with the father-of-one’s supporters to help get his social media pages shutdown.
‘To my dear friends, I never ask anything of you. But right now I’m going to ask you a huge favour,’ he wrote.
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‘Can you please report Danny’s account as a scam so that Instagram can delete his page on him. We don’t want him seeing all the comments when he gets out.’
Mr Wolf also claimed ‘Danny is innocent’ and warned that media outlets would be ‘sued something severe.. mark my words’ when Zayat is no longer in custody.
Tatiana Dokhotaru (right) is pictured with her mother Olga Dokhotaru (left)
The appeal appeared to work – with Zayat’s Facebook and Instagram accounts no longer viewable.
Meanwhile, tributes have continued to pour in online for Ms Dokhotaru – a Russian national who migrated to Australia around a decade ago – as she is remembered as a ‘beautiful and hardworking’ mum.
On Tuesday, her heartbroken parents Olga Dokhotaru and Dennis Thievin spoke out to slam the police response to their daughter’s call – which is now the subject of a critical incident investigation.
‘Had they responded in a timely manner, Tania may be alive today,’ Mr Thieven told Seven News.
‘Surely it could have been done better than it was.’
Ms Dokhotaru added: ‘[She was] a happy, strong woman’.
‘I’m lost, big time…I never, never would expect to hear news (of her death).’
Zayat is next due to face court on Friday.
According to a police fact sheet tendered in court, Ms Dokhotaru (pictured) invited Zayat to her flat, where she lived with their young son, on Friday night – where the couple allegedly began arguing about 11.40pm
