On Friday, nearly five years after
investigators believe 6-year-old Isabel Celis was taken from her bed in Tucson,
Arizona, police announced they had found her remains in a remote
area nearby, PEOPLE confirms.
“This is not
the ending that any of us hoped for, but it is also not the ending of the
case,” Tucson Police Chief Chris Magnus told reporters, according to Fox 17.
A portion of Isabel’s remains were sent to an
independent lab for DNA analysis, Tucson police said in a statement obtained by
PEOPLE.
“Unfortunately, the results of this DNA
analysis did confirm that the remains were those of Isabel Celis,” Chief Magnus
said Friday.
The search for Isabel began on April 21,
2012, after her father discovered her missing from her bedroom on a Saturday
morning in early spring. Her case garnered national attention - triggering one
of the largest searches for a missing child in Arizona’s history.
Police said they found the little girl’s
remains in March but did not disclose what led them to the rural part of Pima
County, Arizona, where they were discovered.
No arrests have been made. Magnus declined to
discuss whether there are any suspects in the case, according to the Arizona Daily Star.
Described as a happy-go-lucky
child who liked to wear her hair in braids and had two missing teeth, Isabel
was last seen by her family when she went to bed about 11 p.m. on Friday, April
20, 2012, according to police.
Her father discovered that she was missing at 8 a.m. the next morning when he
went to wake her up, police said. Her mother had left for work an hour earlier.
Immediately after Isabel vanished,
more than 100 law enforcement officials — including FBI and U.S. Marshals —
began to search for her.
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