UPDATE: Kiely Rodni‘s body was positively identified during an autopsy on Aug. 23, the Placer County Sheriff’s Office told E! News.
Police said they are “in communication with Kiely’s family and offer our deepest condolences to them during this extremely difficult time.” The investigation is ongoing, they added.
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Authorities believe the body of missing teen Kiely Rodni has been found inside a vehicle recently pulled from a lake.
During a press conference on Aug. 22, Nevada County Sheriff Shannon Moon said it’s “more than likely” the human remains—which was discovered inside a car that had been submerged underwater at the Prosser Creek Reservoir near Truckee, California—belongs to Rodni, though officials noted they have “not been able to positively identify” their findings yet.
“We believe it is the missing person,” she said. “We wanted the family to have that information first.”
The body and the vehicle were recovered by authorities on Aug. 21 after Adventures With Purpose, a volunteer group of divers whose YouTube channel is dedicated to helping families solve missing persons cases, made the discovery using their own equipment and informed local law enforcement agents, according to Moon.
Captain Sam Brown of the Nevada County Sheriff’s Office added that investigators had previously searched the lake and put “over 15,000 man hours” into the investigation, but varying factors such the reservoir’s water levels may have played a part in how they hadn’t been able to locate the vehicle. He noted that Adventure With Purpose said the car found 14 feet in the lake, after water levels had dropped three to four feet in the past few weeks.