The father of a Florida woman who went missing while on vacation in Costa Rica claims that local authorities will not allow him into the morgue to identify if a body that was found during the search, is his daughter.
On Monday, officials with Costa Rica's Judicial Investigation Agency (OIJ) told ABC Action News that a body was been found on the Airbnb property where 36-year-old Carla Stefaniak had been staying.
According to a post on the Facebook page dedicated to finding Stefaniak, her father, Carlos Caicedo is meeting with a lawyer and demands to view the body.
OIJ officials tell ABC Action News that the body was buried in a mountainous area located in the back of the property, roughly 1,000 feet away from where the 36-year-old Miami woman had been staying. OIJ agents had been searching the area with specialized dogs.
An autopsy was performed on the woman's body, they say that she had stab wounds around the neck and extremities and report blunt-force trauma to the head.
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OIJ officials say that the body appears to be Stefaniak however, they are unable to confirm that without fingerprinting. The FBI is involved to conduct those tests, according to OIJ agents. If fingerprinting does not work, they will make a DNA and dental comparison.
Law enforcement in Costa Rica had initially told Stefaniak's family members, who had flown down to Costa Rica to search for her, that they would be able to view and attempt to identify the body on Tuesday morning at 7 a.m. As of Tuesday night, they still had not been allowed in, according to a family friend.
ABC Action News' Michael Paluska and Isabel Rosales contributed to this report.
