Authorities hunting for former soldier Travis Decker who was wanted in connection to the brutal murder of his three young daughters in early June have found human remains less than a mile from the original crime scene in Leavenworth, Washington State.
After a large-scale manhunt of the mountains of Washington State and Idaho’s Sawtooth National Forest, where it was believed he could be relying on his military background to evade capture, the body, believed to be Decker’s, was found in a remote wooded area during a “routine grid-by-grid” search of the area, the Chelan County Sheriff's Office said.
Chelan County Sheriff Mike Morrison said the body showed signs of severe decomposition, but expects DNA results from the coroner's office as soon as Friday.
"While positive identification has not yet been confirmed, preliminary findings suggest the remains belong to Travis Decker," he said in a statement.
The discovery marks the end of a huge search operation in a shocking case that has gripped the nation.
Decker’s three daughters were reported missing by their mother after they were not returned home on 30 May after what was supposed to be a three-hour visit mandated by a custody arrangement.
Decker, 32, has been wanted since June 2, when a sheriff’s deputy found the bodies of his three daughters – 9-year-old Paityn Decker, 8-year-old Evelyn Decker and 5-year-old Olivia Decker – at an abandoned campsite in the remote Washington Cascades region outside Leavenworth.
Decker’s truck was found at the campsite with bloody handprints on the tailgate, and the bodies of his daughters were found less than 100-yards away, down an embankment. They had multiple plastic bags over their heads and authorities said there was evidence their hands had been zip-tied.
The campsite showed signs of recent activity, including a tent and cooler near Decker’s truck, which contained food, blankets and a wallet, which authorities suggested meant Decker had fled the scene unprepared unless he had already stashed supplies elsewhere.
The enormous search operation which ensued involved local, state and federal officials and included use of helicopters, drones, cadaver dogs, a swiftwater river-rescue team which swam and waded through miles of river, in the search for Decker.
Decker was an infantryman in the Army from March 2013 to July 2021 and deployed to Afghanistan for four months in 2014. He has training in navigation, survival and other skills, authorities have said, and he once spent more than two months living in the backwoods off the grid.
The U.S. Marshals Service had offered a reward of up to $20,000 for information leading to his capture.
Investigators said Decker had also exhibited concerning mental health issues before the girls’ killings.
Just three days before he and his daughters disappeared, he was involved in a car crash and appeared “nervous and fidgety”, according to a report.
“I could tell he was not in his full senses,” the other driver said of Decker.
Last September, Decker’s ex-wife, Whitney Decker, said in a petition requesting to modify their parenting arrangements that his mental health issues had worsened and that he had become increasingly unstable.
She said he was often living out of his truck, and she wanted to restrict him from having overnight visits with their daughters until he found housing.
An autopsy determined the girls' cause of death to be suffocation, the sheriff’s office said.
