Still no trace of little Kata, the 5-year-old Peruvian girl who disappeared in Florence on 10 June. For seven hours, from 8.30 to 15.30, the carabinieri, with a vast deployment of forces and means that also saw the men of the Ros and the Gis involved, sifted through the former Astor hotel, the occupied building cleared yesterday where the girl lived with her family together with different families. During the research, a cavity with access to the garden was also discovered and a cell phone was found in a dumpster on which further investigations will be carried out. Another ravine on the upper floor would also have been found, near one of the terraces.
The maxi-search will continue and in the meantime the former hotel, now under seizure, will continue to be guarded by the police. Useful details could come from the camera of a private citizen, just identified by the police, which covers the entrance to an area adjacent to the courtyard of the former hotel. According to the investigators, if someone had moved away from that area, climbing over the wall of the courtyard of the building, the camera could have filmed it. The soldiers of the specialized groups of the Arma today went in search of every possible element attributable to the small girl but even today no traces of Kataleya would have emerged. Prosecutor Christine von Borries was also on the spot.
The searches involved, in particular, the upper part of the large building, where the false ceilings were removed. Fiber optic probes, cameras and drones were used to inspect the upper floor and one of the terraces to which there is no access by ladder. The inspections then concentrated on manholes, ravines, tunnels, pipes, manholes, and an attic, also not normally accessible. The building’s foundation compartment was also checked. Here the investigators would have used a cutter to enter the foundations of the building. Nothing would have been left to chance.
Over time, the hotel would have undergone several changes and also has ravines that are difficult to reach. There are 132, including 42 minors, the people who lived inside the building registered in yesterday’s eviction. The inspection was suspended in the afternoon to take stock of the situation and plan the continuation of the activity. Meanwhile, the lawyers Sharon Matteoni and Filippo Zanasi, lawyers who assist Kata’s parents, announce that they have engaged the general of the carabinieri on leave as a consultant Luciano Garofanoformer commander of the Ris of Parma.
And through their lawyers Katherine Alvarez Vasquez and Miguel Angel Romero Chicclo, the father and mother of the little girl renew their appeal: “Those who know something speak up. Even the smallest clue could be useful for the investigation and nothing will be overlooked. The absolute priority in this time is to bring Kata home.” Yesterday the couple returned to the former hotel where “they recovered their personal belongings that had remained in the previously occupied room” add Matteoni and Zanasi. A new garrison of the Peruvian community for little Kata was organized in front of the building: a small group with white heart-shaped balloons and signs asking for the little girl to be found, chanted prayers and pleaded for the little girl to go home. An invitation to prayer for the little girl came from the chaplain of the Latin American community, Father Juan Manuel Núñez Rubio while Don Roberto Turco, parish priest of the nearby Precious Blood parish announced a prayer for the recovery of Kata.