Mushroom Hunters Find Skull Of Missing 74-Year-Old Hazel Martin’s Disappearance Treated As Homicide For A Year

A human skull found near here Monday by mushroom hunters was identified Tuesday as the remains of 74-year-old Hazel Martin, missing since last May.

The discovery marks a major development in the suspected homicide case.

“It’s really probably the biggest lead of the year,” Latah County Sheriff Jeff Crouch said. “We were still working the case, but this adds another dimension.”

An Onaway, Idaho, couple picking morels near White Pine Drive found the remains about 50 yards off Highway 6, just a few miles north of the small Princeton-area home from which Martin disappeared a year ago.

Family members reported Martin missing the morning after she won $7 playing pinochle at the Princeton Grange Hall. Large-scale community searches over the following weeks turned up bedding and a pair of slippers belonging to Martin along the Palouse River.

But until this week, family, friends and local law enforcement remained frustrated over the lack of new leads.

After finding the skull Monday at 2 p.m., the Onaway man headed to his job at a St. Maries mill before contacting Benewah County authorities, who notified Latah County, Crouch said.

Donald Tyler, chairman of the University of Idaho’s Department of Sociology, Anthropology and Criminology, positively identified the remains Tuesday, by comparing them with X-rays and dental records.

“It is definitely Hazel Martin,” said Tyler, a forensic anthropologist who aids local and federal authorities in skeletal identifications. “The skull was consistent with that of a woman between 70 to 80 years of age and the dental records matched, so that pretty much locked it up.”

Local authorities had found nothing during a search this past weekend using specially trained dogs from Salmon, Idaho.

“We were systematically searching the areas, and we just hadn’t gotten to that one,” Crouch said.

The canine search team was about to be returned when the skull was found by the couple, but the dogs will now stay to help investigators comb for more evidence.

Law enforcement officials, including U.S. Forest Service and Idaho Fish and Game representatives, worked from 2 p.m. until after dark Monday and all day Tuesday securing the area and searching for more remains.

Crouch declined to say if anything incriminating was found at the scene, or if other bones in the vicinity are suspected to belong to Martin.

The heavily wooded area is home to many animals, and all bones collected from the site will be scrutinized, Crouch said.

Martin was active in a number of civic activities in the Potlatch-Princeton area and kept in frequent contact with friends and family members. For them, Monday’s sad discovery concludes a painful year of not knowing whether Martin was still alive.

“(Closure) is what we’ve been wanting all along, but now that that time is here, it has taken away a little bit of hope,” said Paula Frazier of Potlatch, one of Martin’s four grandchildren.

, DataTimes