Missing Spokane Valley man died of hypothermia

A body found near Elk, Wash. has been confirmed as the 71-year-old man suffering from dementia who went missing from his Spokane Valley home Nov. 23. Family told police Samuel H. Count went missing after he said was going to the store for a loaf of bread. He never returned. The following week, Spokane County Sheriff’s Office searched the county for signs of his whereabouts. On a tip he may have been going to Elk, Wash. search crews found his car deep in the woods and his body about a quarter-mile away, said Spokane County sheriff’s Deputy Craig Chamberlin. He died of hypothermia, according to the Spokane County Medical Examiner’s Office, but there’s no way to measure how long he had been out there.