• Body Dumped in Remote Pond: Luciano Frattolin allegedly drove 45 miles from Lake George to Ticonderoga, New York, to hide his 9-year-old daughter Melina’s body in a weed-choked pond—contradicting his false abduction claim.
• Fabricated Kidnapping Story: Frattolin staged a hoax, telling police two men in a white van snatched Melina while he was briefly away. Investigators quickly uncovered inconsistencies, exposing his lies.
• Public Fury Mounts: The cold-blooded deception and gruesome discovery have ignited outrage as police work to unravel the motive behind Melina’s killing.

A case that has shaken both sides of the U.S.–Canada border took a chilling turn when investigators revealed the location of 9-year-old Melina Frattolin’s body—someone dumped her in a remote, weed-choked pond nearly an hour’s drive from where her father claimed kidnappers took her. The revelation has sparked public fury and disbelief, as a desperate search for a missing child ended in horror.

Luciano Frattolin, a 45-year-old Canadian businessman from Montreal, allegedly murdered his daughter during what should have been a joyful father-daughter vacation in upstate New York. But the public isn’t just horrified by the crime—they’re outraged by his deliberate, cold-hearted attempt to mislead police and the revolting way he hid her body.

A Peaceful Setting Turned Sinister

Investigators found Melina’s small, lifeless body submerged in the murky, shallow waters of a secluded Ticonderoga pond – a quiet corner of New York’s Adirondack region few ever see. Dense woods encircled the site, shielding it from tourist traffic and prying eyes. This was no accident of geography, but a deliberate choice: private, hidden, forgotten.

According to New York State Police, Frattolin deliberately chose that location—45 miles south of where he claimed Melina had vanished near Lake George—in an apparent attempt to throw off investigators.

Officers described the scene as “deeply disturbing.” Melina had been left in just a few feet of water, in an area accessible only by narrow forest paths and rarely used backroads. The spot was so out-of-the-way that it took state forest rangers to locate it, using search dogs and aerial surveillance.

One officer said the pond was so still and overgrown, it looked untouched for years. “It’s the kind of place you’d only find if you were looking for somewhere no one goes,” he said grimly.

A Web of Lies—and a Calculated Route

What’s most unsettling, authorities say, is how calculated Frattolin’s actions appear. After allegedly killing his daughter on Saturday evening, he drove her body miles away to Ticonderoga and placed her in the water—then called police hours later with a bogus story about an abduction.

In his call to the Warren County Sheriff’s Office, Frattolin claimed he had stopped near the highway by Lake George to relieve himself in the woods. He said that when he returned to the car, Melina was gone and he saw a suspicious white van speeding away.

It sounded like a parent’s worst nightmare. But as detectives began digging, the cracks appeared fast. There was no sign of an abduction. No white van, nor witnesses, nor tire tracks. And the location? Too public, too populated, and too unlikely for a kidnapping without a trace.

Meanwhile, surveillance footage from earlier that day showed Melina alive and well, smiling beside her father in Saratoga Springs just an hour before she disappeared.

The pond lay far from Lake George’s bustling tourist hubs—its souvenir shops, restaurants, and hiking trails. Instead, it waited down a crumbling backroad, swallowed by state forest, in country so remote even locals rarely ventured there.

Officials said Frattolin must have gone out of his way to find a place so concealed. “It wasn’t a spur-of-the-moment decision,” one source close to the case said. “He knew exactly what he was doing. He chose that pond to make sure no one would find her.”

Anger and Disgust Over Location

The public recoiled in disgust at how Frattolin discarded his daughter’s body like roadside garbage. What chills most isn’t just the murder—it’s the calculated choice to dump her in wilderness so remote it seemed designed to make her disappear forever.

On social media, the outrage is palpable:

“He didn’t even bury her. He dumped her in a pond like she didn’t matter,” one Facebook user wrote.
“She trusted him. He used that trust to do this… and then tried to make it look like someone else did it.”

Even veteran officers have admitted this case has shaken them. “We’ve seen a lot,” one New York State Police official said. “But this? This is pure cruelty.”

Still Waiting for Answers

As Frattolin remains in custody and awaits trial, one burning question remains: Why? What drove a father, with no known history of violence, to end his daughter’s life and leave her in such a vile, lonely place?

An autopsy is underway, and investigators continue to build their timeline. But the emotional damage is already done. A family has been shattered. A child is gone. And a small pond in Ticonderoga—once just a quiet part of the forest—will now forever be tied to one of the most sickening crimes the region has ever seen.

This wasn’t just a murder. It was a deliberate cover-up, staged to waste police resources, fool a grieving mother, and paint the killer as a victim.

But in the end, the truth floated to the surface.

And the place where he tried to hide his crime may now help ensure he can never escape justice.