Police Believe they Have Found the Body of Missing 15 Year Old Iowa Girl Kathlynn Shepard in the Des Moines River near Boone, Iowa (Update: Autopsy Confirms Body forund was Kathlynn Shepard)

The police believe they have found the body of 15 year old missing Kathlynn Shepard in the Des Moines River Friday night near Boone, Iowa. Although not yet positively identified, authorities believe it is the body of Kathlynn Shepard, who was kidnapped two weeks ago with another girl. At a news conference at the Boone Police Station, police said the clothing was consistent with what Shepard was wearing when she was abducted, along with 12 year old Dezi Hughes, while walking home from the school bus in Dayton in Webster County on May 20. An autopsy is scheduled for Saturday.

A body found in the Des Moines River on Friday evening is likely that of kidnapped 15-year-old girl who has been missing since she and another girl were abducted more than two weeks ago, state authorities said early Saturday morning. Authorities say they’re confident that the body a fisherman found Friday night in the Des Moines River near Boone is Kathlynn Shepard’s. An autopsy is scheduled for Saturday. Gerard Meyers of the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation said Boone County dispatchers received a call from people fishing at 6:59 p.m. about a body in the river underneath the Kate Shelley High Bridge near Boone. “We believe it to be Kathlynn Shepard,” Meyers said at a news conference at the Boone Police Station just after midnight. He said the clothing was consistent with what Shepard was wearing when she was abducted, along with 12-year-old Dezi Hughes, while walking home from the school bus in Dayton in Webster County on May 20.

Dezi Hughes  escaped from the suspected kidnapper, a registered sex offender Michael Klunder. Hughes was found wearing zip ties and authorities found similar zip ties on the body located Friday night. Klunder, a registered sex offender, committed suicide hours after the abduction.

For more updates, comments and to provide your own, go to Scared Monkeys Missing Persons: Kathlynn Shepard.

UPDATE I: Iowa Chief State Medical Examiner Dr. Julia Goodin confirmed that the body found Friday night in Boone, Iowa was that of  which is about 11 miles from where Kathlynn