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Skeletal Remains Found In Mesa County Belong To Man Missing For 26 Years

HUMAN SKELETON FOUND. map
(credit; CBS)

GATEWAY, Colo. (CBS4) - Police have confirmed a skeleton found in a half-buried car in Mesa County last Thursday belonged to a man who went missing 26 years ago.

Deputies were dispatched to John Brown Canyon, south of Gateway, after a hiker reported finding a vehicle containing skeletal remains. The "very old" station wagon had no license plates that was partially hidden by rocks and other sediment presumably washed down over the years

"Deputies, Mesa County Search and Rescue, and the Mesa County coroner recovered the remains and various personal items from the vehicle, giving closure to a family who made a missing person report in 1987," Heather Benjamin with the Mesa County Sheriff's Office said in a statement.

Audrey Vasey reported her husband Ronald Vasey missing on Aug. 6, 1987. Ronald, 65 at the time he went missing, was in poor health.

The Mesa County coroner released Ronald's identity on Monday and called his death a suicide.

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