Melina Frattolin, the 9-year-old Montreal girl allegedly murdered by her father in upstate New York, drowned in a homicide, state police said Tuesday.
“Asphyxia due to drowning” was ruled her official cause of death, with final autopsy results pending.
Melina’s father, 45-year-old Luciano Frattolin, pleaded not guilty on Monday to charges of second-degree murder and concealing a human corpse. He remains in custody at a county jail.
The pair had embarked on a father-daughter vacation trip from Canada on July 11, police said Monday in announcing the charges. After touring around with stops in Connecticut, New York City and elsewhere, they’d been due back in Montreal on Sunday.
Her parents were estranged, and Melina lived full-time with her mother, who knew about the trip, Lt. Robert McConnell of the State Police Bureau of Criminal Investigation said at a press conference.
The girl and her father were seen on surveillance video around 5:30 p.m. Saturday in Saratoga Springs, about 35 miles north of Albany. An hour later, Melina told her mother by phone that they were on their way back to Canada. Everything seemed fine, police said, with no indication that the girl was under duress.
At around 10 p.m., Frattolin called 911 to report that Melina had been kidnapped. He initially said he pulled over to relieve himself near Exit 22 of I-87 by Lake George, and returned to the car to find his daughter gone and see a white van speeding south. However, his story changed in a subsequent interview in which he said two men had forced her into a white van.
The Warren County Sheriff’s Office issued an Amber Alert but rescinded it a few hours later when Frattolin’s kidnapping claim began unraveling after they found no evidence of an abduction, or even of a van.
Police launched an extensive search in Ticonderoga, about 30 miles north of Lake George, where forest rangers found the girl’s body hidden under a log in the shallow end of a pond just before 2 p.m. Sunday.
Melina’s death rattled the community, a historic hamlet of just under 5,000 near the Vermont border, while reports emerged in Canada about financial troubles for Frattolin, and sketchy business deals.
NYSP
Melina Frattolin, 9. (NYSP)
Ticonderoga residents held a vigil Tuesday night “to shine our light on Melina’s young life that was tragically cut short,” organizer Bridgett Cruz wrote on Facebook, saying she had woken up with an urge to honor the girl.
“Ticonderoga will forever be her soul’s resting place,” Cruz said. “I want to honor her life and let her know we will be her light in this dark time.”
With News Wire Services
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