Rome's mystery homeless woman thought by some to have been Madeleine McCann but later identified as a Swedish student has said she will not return home during an emotional reunion with her parents.
Her father, Tahvo Jauhojarvi, told The Sun Online his daughter, Embla, 21, was 'a wreck' and had refused to speak with him when the two met in Italy, despite having spent the past six months living rough on the streets without any contact with her family.
He added: "She was almost like a zombie. She wanted to go out (on the streets) again and do what she was doing. She didn't say anything - she didn't want me to contact her."
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British newspapers had reported that she looked like a number of missing girls, including Madeleine, the British toddler who vanished on holiday with her family in Praia da Luz, Portugal in 2007.
Embla's dad had wanted to bring her home. Credit: Facebook
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But the formal identification of the woman showed that she was in fact the 21-year-old Swede who has been diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, a form of high-functioning autism.
Embla Jauhojärvi, from Stockholm, is thought to have travelled to Italy six months ago to study.
A spokesman from Rome's military police, the Carabinieri, told the Daily Mail: "We brought her in and she told us her name is Maria and that she is English and said she was 20.
"But the date of birth she gave us would make her 21. We let her go because she hasn't done anything wrong."
"When we asked her why she was here, she simply said she left her family in England, without giving a precise reason."
Although Met Police and McCann family supporters disproved the claim that she was Madeleine, the attention her story received caught the eye of her father in Stockholm and led to the family being reunited - sadly it seems everything didn't go as well as was hoped.
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Featured image credit: Facebook
Featured Image Credit:Topics: Homeless, Madeleine McCann