Remains Found in Search for Dad Accused of Killing Kids

Authorities say they have found remains they believe are Travis Decker, an ex-soldier wanted in the deaths of his three daughters, in the mountains of Washington state, the AP reports. The Chelan County Sheriff's Office said in a statement Thursday that it was processing the site with the help of the Washington State Patrol crime scene response team. They will follow up with DNA analysis, it said. "While positive identification has not yet been confirmed, preliminary findings suggest the remains belong to Travis Decker," the statement said. Decker, 32, has been wanted since June 2, when a sheriff's deputy found his truck and the bodies of his three daughters—9-year-old Paityn Decker, 8-year-old Evelyn Decker, and 5-year-old Olivia Decker—at a campground outside Leavenworth.

Three days earlier he failed to return the girls to their mother's home in Wenatchee, about 100 miles east of Seattle, following a scheduled visit. Decker was an infantryman in the Army from March 2013 to July 2021 and deployed to Afghanistan for four months in 2014. He had training in navigation, survival, and other skills, authorities said, and once spent more than two months living in the backwoods off the grid. More than 100 officials with an array of state and federal agencies searched hundreds of square miles, much of it mountainous and remote, by land, water and air during the on and off search. The US Marshals Service offered a reward of up to $20,000 for information leading to his capture.