Swiss twins “resting in peace” suicidal father wrote (VIDEO)
Italian rangers show the pictures of six-year-old twin girls, Alessia and Livia Schepp, outside the Cerignola Station in southern Italy on Febraury 5, 2011. Police in three countries were hunting for six-year-old twin girls today after their father who had snatched them from their home in Switzerland threw himself under an Italian train, reports said.
Police say that the father of missing Swiss twins Alessia and Livia Schepp wrote a letter saying he had killed them.
State police said that Matthias Kaspar Schepp said in the letter that 6-year-olds were dead, and that he would now kill himself.
The letter was sent from Italy on Feb. 3, the same day as Schepp was found dead after apparently throwing himself under a train in southern Italy.
In the note, sent to his wife Irina Lucidi before he died last week, Schepp wrote that the twins were "resting in peace" and "did not suffer," Italian newspaper Corriere Della Sera reported.
Police also revealed that the Canadian-born Schepp consulted websites on travel to Corsica as well as those detailing suicide, poisoning and firearms, shortly before the girls' disappearance.
Witnesses reported seeing Schepp with the girls on the ferry from Marseille and Propriano. Police now believe Schepp made a return trip on the same ferry alone, leading to fears he may have drugged the twins and dumped their bodies overboard.
Police across Europe have mounted a huge search for the twins since they failed to return to the family home in Lausanne, Switzerland, on Jan. 30.
The contents of the note were not made public immediately by police hunting the girls for fear of discouraging potential witnesses to come forward.
Witnesses have so far said that they saw Alessia and Livia on board a ferry between Marseille and Corsica with Schepp.
The mother of the twins made an emotional plea on Italian television this week, urging viewers to contact the police if they had any information that could bring an end to her ordeal.
Police in Switzerland, France and Italy are focusing their search on the French island of Corsica.
The story you just read is not locked behind a paywall because listeners and readers like you generously support our nonprofit newsroom. Now more than ever, we need your help to support our global reporting work and power the future of The World. Can we count on you?