Body Believed to Be Missing Actress Adea Shabani Found

Human remains found in a shallow grave are believed to be those of missing aspiring actress Adea Shabani.

On Tuesday morning, the Nevada County Sheriff’s Office and their coroner’s division discovered the human remains of a woman buried in a shallow grave in the Spenceville Wildlife Area in Penn Valley, California, according to a Facebook post made by the sheriff’s office.

“At this point in time, we believe that those remains are the body of Miss. Adea Shabani,” a spokesperson for the Los Angeles Police Department told reporters during a press conference on Tuesday, Entertainment Weekly reports. “We cannot say that conclusively at this point in time because the condition of the remains prohibited positive identification,” he continued, adding that they believed Shabani’s boyfriend, Christopher Spotz, was “somehow involved in her death.”

Shabani, 25, an aspiring actress who moved to the U.S. from Macedonia, was last seen on Feb. 23 in Los Angeles with Spotz. She was reported missing after her friends became worried when she stopped responding to their texts. Her mother flew from Macedonia to L.A. to help with the search.

Spotz reportedly told investigators that he and Shabani had left Los Angeles on Feb. 23 on a road trip to Spotz’s father’s house in northern California. He claimed that they had gotten into an argument in the Santa Clarita area just outside of Los Angeles and that he let her out of the car on the side of the freeway and hadn’t seen her since.

On March 22, Spotz led police on a chase east of Los Angeles after they attempted to pull him over. When police caught up with him, he reportedly took his own life. The stand-off and Spotz’s suicide only intensified the search for Shabani.

While police were unable to make an immediate identification of the body found, they stated that an autopsy was scheduled for Wednesday to determine the victim’s identity and cause and manner of death.