Bones found in burned field

Human bones – apparently those of a child – have been recovered from a recently burned field south of Ritzville, not far from U.S. Highway 395, the Adams County sheriff confirmed late Monday.

The bones were recovered in an area where authorities previously have conducted extensive separate searches for 11-year-old Cody Haynes and 5-year-old Sofia L. Juarez.

Sofia Juarez vanished from Kennewick in February 2003 after being given $1 by her mother and allowed to go buy candy at a neighborhood convenience store. She was never seen again.

Cody Haynes disappeared from his Kittitas home in September 2004. His parents said he was a runaway.

“I can confirm we found bone pieces,” Adams County Sheriff Doug Barger told The Spokesman-Review when he was reached at his home Monday evening.

He scheduled a news conference this morning at the Sheriff’s Department office in Othello, not far from where the discovery was made.

The Adams County sheriff wouldn’t say exactly what types of bones were found, but other sources confirmed a skull was recovered.

“I can’t answer that,” the sheriff said when asked if a skull was found. He did say, however, that there was no doubt the bones were human.

They were discovered Aug. 12 by a local farmer using a field access road within sight of Highway 395, the sheriff said.

“He saw something and didn’t know what it was until he got out in the field and saw it was bones,” the sheriff said. “We’re not talking that many pieces.”

Another source said the discovery was entirely fortuitous: The area is normally waist-deep in weeds, but only blackened earth remained after a series of small fires was started in July by a defective car traveling down the highway.

If a skull or a tooth were recovered, it could contain a DNA sample that could lead to a positive identification.

Authorities have DNA samples from both the missing children.

“I’m hoping there will be enough for DNA, but right now, I just don’t know,” Barger said.

After an initial search by Adams County sheriff’s deputies, the FBI’s Pacific Northwest “Evidence Response Team” was mobilized for an extensive search of the area on Thursday and Friday, Barger said.

The sheriff said the bones are in the custody of his department and will be taken this week to Kathy Taylor, a forensic anthropologist with the King County Medical Examiner’s Office in Seattle.

“Until the forensic anthropologist completes her work, probably in a couple of weeks, we don’t have a clue who this might be,” the sheriff said.

He said the bones did appear to be those of a child and the list of known missing children in the region includes Haynes and Juarez.

Two days of searching late last week involved as many as 50 FBI agents, sheriff’s deputies, the Adams County sheriff’s posse and the Kittitas County Search and Rescue Team. The search area also was photographed from the air.

Barger estimated that searchers covered 100 acres in a tedious but thorough grid search.

The bones may have been dragged to the discovery site by a coyote or other wild animal, the sheriff said, and other locations may be searched after the forensic anthropologist completes her examination.