Yet another potential sighting of accused killer Travis Decker has gone cold as officials in Washington state have begun scaling back their search efforts for the man accused of killing his three young daughters.
Authorities in the state have been searching for the 33-year-old ever since his daughters – Paityn, 9, Evelyn, 8, and Olivia, 5 – were found strangled to death at a campsite outside Leavenworth, Washington in early June.
It is now believed Decker, 33, dumped their bodies and his truck, and he has been wanted on murder charges since.
There was a glimmer of hope on Friday, when the King County Sheriff’s Office announced it had received a tip at around 6pm that the killer father was seen near Snoqualmie Pass and the Pacific Crest Trail area – about 55 miles from Seattle.
‘As locating Decker is a priority, KCSO dispatched multiple patrol units, along with TAC-30, K9 Units and Guardian 1 to aid in the search,’ the sheriff’s office told KIRO.
‘Neighboring law enforcement agents were notified as well.’
But an extensive search for the former Army Ranger came up empty, and the search efforts were called off at around 9.15pm.
The announcement came just days after the Chelan County Sheriff’s Office – which initially led the search efforts – said it was scaling back its response after receiving fewer tips about Decker’s possible whereabouts.
Yet another potential sighting of accused killer Travis Decker, 33, has gone cold
Decker is accused of killing his three young daughters – Olivia, 5; Evelyn, 8; and Paityn, 9
Chelan County Sheriff Mike Morrison announced on Thursday it is ‘not likely’ Decker is still alive and on the loose
Much of the search efforts have been focused on national forest areas and parts of the Pacific Crest Trail – which runs from the Canadian border in Washington all the way down to the Mexican border in California.
The failed search this week follows a number of similar sightings that have not materialized, with officials admitting in June that a trove of evidence taken from his suspected hiding site did not match any of his DNA.
Thus far, each effort to find and capture Decker – who is wanted on state and federal charges for murder and kidnapping – have ended in a dead end.
Even a tip that Decker may be hiding out in Idaho proved to be false, with someone mistaking a local man for the wanted killer.
As the search efforts now reach a third consecutive month, Chelan County Sheriff Mike Morrison suggested it is ‘not likely’ Decker is still alive and on the loose.
‘His ability to go through that area and not be detected would have been challenging, let alone the challenges involved with him having to hike through all the snow that was up there toward the Pacific Crest Trail at the time,’ he told reporters on Thursday.
Still, he insisted to KHQ that the department remains ‘optimistic’ it will locate the accused killer, even if it is just his body.
‘We still recognize we have a job to do,’ Morrison said.
He added that deputies ‘are going through and making sure that we are covering our paths twice, sometimes three times, and also making sure that we are utilizing our search and rescue investigative units appropriately.’
Search efforts have been focused on national forest areas and parts of the Pacific Crest Trail
Morrison said sheriff’s deputies will go over areas that they have already checked for the murder suspect
Yet some experts, including law enforcement and security analyst Todd McGhee, have said Decker’s extensive military background may have enabled him to live in the wilderness undetected.
He had joined the Army in 2013 and served in Afghanistan before transferring to the Washington National Guard in 2021, a communications director for the Washington Military Department previously confirmed to the Daily Mail.
The Guard was in the process of a disciplinary discharge due to Decker’s absences when his daughters were killed.
He had been suffering from mental health issues at the time, and had recently been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder.
Decker was even court-mandated to receive mental health treatment and domestic violence anger management counseling but had refused.
Police said he was also homeless and living out of his car by the time he picked up his three girls from their mother’s house on May 30.
Still, his ex-wife Whitney told police she didn’t believe Decker was dangerous, and that he loved his daughters, with whom he had a ‘good relationship.’
Decker’s ex-wife Whitney told police she did not believe he was dangerous and that he loved his three daughters
However, dashcam footage from a May 27 traffic stop has added to the image of Decker’s poor mental state at the time.
Decker appeared in the 19-minute video with his arms crossed and a bored expression before he leaned on his car and then sat on the bumper.
At one point, he could be seen resting his head on his truck bed as the other driver and police officer interact.
After the incident, the other driver told KING 5, which obtained the video, that Decker appeared ‘nervous and fidgety’ and ‘kept telling me not to call police’ claiming he would go to jail over the accident.
When the driver told Decker he had to call police to report the crash, he said the alleged killer’s body language was ‘almost intimidating.’
‘I could tell he was not in his full senses,’ the driver added.
At the end of the video, Decker shook the driver’s hand for nine seconds. When the driver tried to pull away, Decker continued asking if he was going to be okay, the driver said.
The traffic stop happened three days before Decker picked up his daughters at their mother’s house for the last time, according to police.
Whitney called police after Decker failed to bring them back. She told cops he was ‘quieter than usual’ when he collected the girls, which was ‘out of character’ for him.
His vehicle was eventually found on June 2, with his daughter’s remains nearby.
An ensuing autopsy then confirmed that the three girls died of suffocation and their deaths were ruled a homicide.
