Shannon`s Mother Found Guilty Of Kidnap

Prosecutors said the schoolgirl was drugged and probably tied to a leash during her incarceration.

The mother of Shannon Matthews, the West Yorkshire schoolgirl who vanished for 24 days earlier this year, was found guilty on Thursday of kidnapping her daughter to claim a large newspaper reward for her recovery.

Karen Matthews, 33, and her co-accused Michael Donovan, 40, were both convicted at Leeds Crown Court of kidnap, false imprisonment and perverting the course of justice, the Press Association reported.

Prosecutors said the schoolgirl was drugged and probably tied to a leash during her incarceration as Matthews and Donovan, the uncle of her then boyfriend Craig Meehan, plotted to collect the 50,000 pound reward.

Shannon was nine when she went missing on Feb. 19 as she walked home from school.

Matthews reported her daughter missing and made a series of tearful TV appeals for help in finding her as West Yorkshire Police launched a huge search that cost 3.2 million pounds.

Many local residents also joined the hunt, fearing that the girl had been abducted.

She was eventually found by detectives in the base of a divan bed in Donovan's flat, around a mile from her home in Dewsbury. Officers had thought the flat was empty until they heard a child's voice coming from the bedroom.

"Stop it, you're frightening me," the voice had said.

Shannon then emerged, scared and crying, from the bed where she had been hidden. Donovan was also discovered hiding in the bed after Shannon had been removed.

The court heard that when Matthews was told her missing daughter had been found safe, she was more interested in a phone ringtone than where she was found or how she was.

During the trial, Matthews and Donovan both blamed each other for the plot. Donovan said the schoolgirl's mother had offered him money and had threatened him into looking after the youngster.

Matthews told the jury she did not know her daughter was at Donovan's flat and said she was shocked when Shannon was found there.