(reuters) -- Sheikh Mohammed al-Jirani disappeared last December from outside his home in the Qatif region.
SPA said a security officer and one of the kidnappers were killed in a clash on Dec. 19 and a second kidnapper was arrested. It also said the judge's body had been found in the remote farming district of Awamiya but did not say when he had been killed.
Authorities said earlier this year that three men being sought in connection with the abduction were already on a wanted list for their suspected involvement in "terrorist attacks" in eastern Saudi.
Since 2011 the region has been shaken by frequent, though mostly peaceful, protests by the Shi'ite minority.
(File photo: Saudi troops patrol the Shiite-majority town of Awamiya on October 1, 2017 as they seek to put down a wave of unrest triggered by their demolition of its historic Musawara neighbourhood, AFP)