A prominent German businessman's daughter was killed in what police are calling a "botched" kidnapping.
The 17-year-old student, identified only as Anneli-Marie R, was allegedly walking her dog last Thursday at 7:30 pm near the family's home in Saxony, Germany when she was kidnapped, reported the Examiner. An unidentified man later called the girl's father from her cell phone and proclaimed that they abducted her daughter, demanding a $1.3 million ransom for her return.
Police found DNA on the girl's bicycle, which was left behind during the abduction, that belonged to a 61-year-old known criminal, who police tracked down in a neighboring town. It was only after police found his 39-year-old associate that they were led to girl's body. Her dog was found alive on Monday.
After a four-day search that gripped the nation, even pushing the eurozone crisis off the front pages of newspapers, according to Yahoo! News, police found her body in an abandoned farmhouse near Dresden, using the information gained from the captured suspects.
Police discovered that the girl was killed when the abductors panicked after she saw their faces, reported the Mirror. They didn't wear masks and didn't want to risk her identifying them.
"All the prayers and hopes went unanswered and she is indeed dead," said Dresden police president Dieter Kroll when making the statement to the public that the girl's body has been found.
Both suspects, whose names remain unreleased, have been arrested and charged with murder. The kidnapping took place following a similar case in June in which the son of Reinhold Wuerth, a billionaire German industrialist, was kidnapped for a demanded $2.3 million ransom, before being set free by his captors.
