The San Francisco computer programmer who seemed to vanish mysteriously from his Mission District apartment last month was found dead in a crawl space above his unit, police said.

The body of Christopher Woitel, 50, was discovered "hidden from plain view" in a 3-foot-high crawl space above his bathroom, police said.

"Personnel from the San Francisco Fire Department arrived and needed to cut a hole in the ceiling in order to retrieve Mr. Woitel's remains," police said in a statement.

"Investigators determined that Mr. Woitel likely accessed the crawl space from the roof of the building and not from inside his apartment," police said..

The cause of death is pending a full autopsy report, but no foul play is suspected, authorities said.

Woitel's case drew headlines after his mom hired a private investigator and several siblings flew to California from the Midwest to hand out flyers and pressure police to investigate.

The gumshoe said Woitel was recorded entering his residential building's front door alone at 8:38 p.m. on Jan. 8, carrying what appeared to be a bottle of wine.

An exhaustive search of subsequent recordings found no evidence Woitel ever left the building again, either through the front lobby or the back stairs.

In his report obtained by the Daily News, the private investigator, Scott Williams, said a building manager entered Woitel's unit with a locksmith and San Francisco Police Department officers on Jan. 16, and Woitel was nowhere to be found.

Williams said he personally checked the attic space above Woitel's unit through an opening in the ceiling inside his bathroom on Feb. 1.

"There were no signs anyone had been up in the large attic space. The flooring was filled with white 'spray in' insulation and it all appeared to be undisturbed," Williams wrote.

"We are hopeful the police investigation will give everyone who loves Chris the answers about where he is. Someone out there knows what happened to him and we hope they will come forward," sister Lara Woitel Haben, 53, told The News on Monday, just hours before learning her brother's body was recovered.

"We are hopeful for the best, but also prepared for the worst. All we want at this point is a thorough investigation by the police and for Chris to come home," she said.

According to Williams' report, Woitel had a history of depression and had sent a message to a friend over Facebook on Jan. 9 saying something "bad was happening in the city" and he wanted to get out, "perhaps up to the mountains."