BOSTON (AP) – More than a decade after her death, authorities believe they have found the remains of a 19-year-old woman who was murdered to stop her from talking to police about a gang’s criminal activities.

U.S. Attorney Michael Sullivan and Essex County District Attorney Jonathan Blodgett said what were believed to be the remains of Aislin Silva were found Friday on a hillside near the William A. Welch Sr. Elementary School in Peabody.

Forensic tests will be done to confirm the identification.

“We’re feeling a tremendous amount of relief, after 10-plus years that they found her,” Silva’s father, Joseph Silva, said Friday night. “Now we have her.”

In September, Paul A. DeCologero, 48, was sentenced to life in prison for ordering Silva’s slaying. Other members of the “DeCologero Crew” have been convicted for roles in her death, while the man believed to have killed her committed suicide in prison in 1997.

Prosecutors said DeCologero ordered members of his gang to kill Silva after police found some guns her boyfriend, Stephen DiCenso, a member of the gang, had stored in her Medford apartment. When DiCenso told DeCologero that Silva was nervous and would probably cooperate with police, he ordered her killed, according to testimony at his trial.

Sullivan said he didn’t expect any more charges to be filed in the case.

“This is evidence to corroborate the evidence that’s already been offered during the course of the trial,” he said.

Joseph Silva described his daughter as a beautiful, smart girl. He described the gang members as, among other things, “idiots” and “losers.”

“She just got involved with people who lied, promised things, stole things,” he said.

Silva’s blood and hair were found in a trash bin behind a Danvers car wash in 1997, but the search for her body dragged over a decade.

Sullivan said investigators always thought the area near the school was one of the best possible sites to find Silva’s body. Authorities also were guided by testimony from a witness who was there when the body was hidden, but whose memory and speech were seriously hurt by a heroin overdose, Sullivan said.

The site, about 100 yards long and nearly as wide as a football field, has changed in the last decade, Sullivan said, with young trees beginning to grow.

“The whole area in terms of topography, geography has changed,” he said. “There was an extraordinary amount of digging over a long period of time.”

Authorities first searched the area’s right side, then eventually moved left. That’s when Silva’s remains were located, buried in a single hole. A shovel, believed to have been used to bury the teenager, was located earlier this year about 150 yards away.

Silva’s family spent many of those days watching the excavation. Joseph Silva’s voice broke when he described the hard work of the investigators, many of whom he knew by name.

“They dug and dug and dug. You can’t believe how much time and effort they did to help her, find her,” he said. “They all took it to heart. They took it to heart to find her.”