DES MOINES — Authorities confirmed Sunday that a body found in the Des Moines River was that of a 15-year-old Iowa girl who was abducted along with a younger friend after getting off a school bus last month.
An autopsy confirmed the body found Friday night under a bridge near Boone is Kathlynn Shepard’s. Her kidnapping on May 20 in the small city of Dayton led to a massive search involving federal, state, and local authorities.
Chief state medical examiner Dr. Julia Goodin said Sunday that Shepard’s death was a homicide and that she died of ‘‘multiple sharp and blunt force injuries.’’ The autopsy was completed a day earlier.
Residents of Dayton, about 60 miles north of Des Moines, had braced for the news. Investigators had thought the body — concealed by debris when discovered by a fisherman — was Shepard’s. Clothes matched what the high school freshman was wearing when a man lured her and a 12-year-old friend into a pickup truck.
Authorities also found zip ties matching ones used to restrain the younger girl, who managed to escape and call 911.
‘‘Today our family has lost part of its soul — not just the Shepard family but the families of Dayton and all of Iowa,’’ the Shepards said in a statement.
Authorities said Shepard and her friend were lured into a pickup that police believe was driven by registered sex offender Michael Klunder. They said Klunder took the girls to a hog confinement facility where he worked, and the 12-year-old girl was able to get away.
Klunder, 42, was found dead hours later at another rural property. Authorities said he hanged himself.
Gerard Meyers, assistant director of field operators for the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, said Sunday that authorities believe Klunder acted alone.