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ATHENS, Greece (AP) — The body of a 4-year-old girl believed to have been killed by her father will likely never be found due to the gruesome way in which her killer disposed of her remains, Greek police said Tuesday.
A nationwide hunt for young Anny, a Bulgarian citizen reported missing by her mother on April 24, ended Monday when both her parents were arrested and her father charged with murder and defiling a body.
Regional police chief Christos Papazafiri said the girl was dismembered and her remains were processed and dumped in various trash bins in Athens "in a way that it was not possible to determine they were body parts."
Papazafiri said the girl was believed to have been killed around April 8-9 and that her 27-year-old father confessed to disposing of his daughter's remains over several days. He said the child's body parts had been made to appear like food leftovers.
The father did not, however, confess to killing the girl, saying he found his daughter dead in bed. He appeared before a prosecutor and was jailed pending trial.
Yannis Panoussis, the public order minister and a criminologist, described the crime as "extreme, non-human behavior" and said the suspect was unlikely to survive prison.
"Usually in these cases these people either commit suicide or meet a violent death from elsewhere," Panoussis said on RealFM radio.
"There is a code of honor inside prisons. ... Therefore that's why I told you I think that in these cases, very quickly we will have the death of the culprit."
Anny's mother, who repeatedly changed her testimony, has also been arrested on charges of endangering a child. Authorities believe she did not know about her partner's actions.
Police said they discovered blood traces matching the child in the pipes, on knives and in other parts of the family's central Athens apartment.
Authorities said that in recent weeks, the father had bought new furniture and cleaning material, sold his daughter's crib and stroller and was arranging to have the apartment pipes replaced.
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