On Thursday, the latest trail led her family and a Vatican-appointed forensic scientist to two tombs inside the Vatican walls, the burial places of princesses well over a century dead. The team only found another mystery: The tombs were empty. Even the bodies of the dead princesses were missing.
It was yet another strange turn for a family that has suffered false leads, red herrings and intense media attention since the girl, Emanuela Orlandi, disappeared at age 15 on June 22, Their quest to discover her fate has taken them down many tortuous paths, following up on tips, anonymous letters and reports of sightings.
She has been linked to the C. This was not the first exhumation in search of her remains. His sources told him to seek the place where an angel was pointing in the cemetery, which is between St.
That led Mr. Orlandi to the tomb of Princess Sophie of Hohenlohe, who died in Giovanni Arcudi, a professor of forensic medicine at the University of Rome Tor Vergata, began the exhumation of the tomb on Thursday. Orlandi formally asked the Vatican to open the tomb of Princess Sophie.
The family received approval last month to have both tombs opened. But any hope that the tombs would provide answers to the family were quickly dashed when the Vatican issued a statement hours after the operation began.
