Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic (Express Daily)Authorities have confirmed that the body of a woman found in the Dominican Republic is indeed one of the two American tourists who had been missing for two weeks.
Portia Ravenelle was identified using fingerprints, National Police Col. Frank Félix Durán Mejia said.
The National Police believe the car Ravenelle, 52, and Orlando Moore, 40, were in plunged into the ocean in the early hours of March 27, not long after the pair left for the airport to catch a flight home to New York.
Detectives spoke to fishermen who said they heard a loud noise coming from 19 kilometers (about 11.8 miles) away from the freeway of Las Americas, Santo Domingo Este early that morning, the National Police said in a news release on Tuesday.
The fishermen said they found a woman who was seriously injured and not carrying any identification, the news release said.
She was taken by ambulance to the hospital with severe trauma and contusions to the head, hospital spokesman Dario Mañon said. Ravenelle died on April 4, before she was in a condition in which hospital officials could take her photo and share it with the media, he said.
Mañon told CNN that no family or friends had called the hospital looking for Ravenelle.
The fishermen also reported seeing a vehicle at the bottom of the sea, but because of rough conditions, divers have not been able to identify the vehicle, Durán