TARRYTOWN — Police say they believe they have recovered the body of a woman whose suicidal jump from the Tappan Zee Bridge in suburban New York echoed her stepfather’s plunge 15 years ago from the same span.
State Police Sgt. Todd Parent says they believe the body found on Sunday afternoon in the Hudson River belongs to Anne Morell Petrillo.
Petrillo was the daughter of slain newspaper heiress Anne Scripps Douglas. Stepfather Scott Douglas leaped to his death from the bridge in 1994 after killing her mother. The family founded The Detroit News.
She was struggling financially, hitting the bottle hard and flirting with death in the years before her suicide, family and friends said.
Witnesses saw Petrillo stop her car on the bridge and jump Thursday.
A pal said had always been distraught over the brutal murder of her mom, Anne Scripps Douglas, spiraled out of control as her inheritance dried up and she tried to sell her home, a pal said.
She left a note, but police have refused to describe it.
Police say the Rockland County medical examiner’s office will make the official identification.