The body of the 18-year-old missing teenager is found in a river two months after their disappearance
- Alex Bendall, 18, better known as Alice, was reported missing in Dorset in February
- Dorset police said a body was found in the River Frome on Saturday afternoon
The body of a missing teenager has been found in a river two months after their disappearance.
Alex Bendall, 18, better known as Alice, was reported missing on February 12 in Dorchester, Dorset.
Tragically, Dorset Police said around 3pm on Saturday that a body had been found in the River Frome near Lubbecke Way in Dorchester.
Known to their family by the pronouns ‘she’ and ‘her’, Alex had been forced to start a new job caring for people with dementia and booked a driving test in the days following his disappearance.
In a call last month, Alex’s father, Paul Bendall, 60, said: ‘It’s like someone planted a bomb in the family and we’re just in pieces. We just want you to be home with the family so we can just be whole again.”
The body of missing teenager Alex Bendall (pictured), 18, better known as Alice, has been found in a river two months after their disappearance
Alice, who was known to their family by the pronouns ‘she’ and ‘her’, should have taken up a new job caring for people with dementia and booked a driving test in the days following her disappearance. Pictured: CCTV footage released by police during a search for Alex
The death is not being treated as suspicious and the coroner has been notified, as well as Alex’s heartbroken family
Their mother Vicky had said, “You have so much to live for. It’s inappropriate to wander without telling us where she might be.’
Extensive searches of the area had taken place in the weeks since their disappearance involving the National Police Air Service, Dorset Search and Rescue, Wiltshire Search and Rescue, Dorset Search Dogs, Hampshire Search & Rescue Dogs and Wessex 4×4.
The death is not being treated as suspicious and the coroner has been notified, as well as Alex’s heartbroken family.
A spokesman for Dorset Police said: ‘A body sadly found in a river in Dorchester is said to be that of a missing teenager from the Dorchester area.
The report of the find near the River Frome in the Lubbecke Way area was received by Dorset Police at about 3pm on Saturday.
“While no formal identification has yet been made, it is believed to be 18-year-old Alex Bendall, who was reported missing on Sunday, February 12.”
Dorset Police said a body was found in the River Frome in the Lubbecke Way area (pictured) in Dorchester around 3pm on Saturday.
