Jaryd Atadero
October 2 1999, Jaryd was three years old when he vanished while hiking with a group of single people who were staying at his father's resort 20 miles away.
At the time of the disappearance, the Atadero’s owned the Poudre River Resort.
Jaryd was walking the trail with the Christian Singles Network group that was staying at the Resort.
At one point the family asked the SAR team and sheriffs if they could go up the trail and view the place where Jaryd vanished.
Allyn was at his resort when the group took Jaryd to the trail.
The sheriffs were telling the family there was no evidence that Jaryd had been abducted.
When the family asked to go down the trail, their response was they were denied.
After they pushed the topic further, they were threatened with arrest if they stepped on the trail.
Early in the search Allyn was at the search headquarters near the trail head and engaged one of the sheriffs officials in a conversation.
He was told that his son was in the river.
The water was extremely cold and the body wouldn’t be found for four years.
Three days into the search, Allyn and Arlyn were on the highway listening to the news when they heard on the radio that Jaryd had approached a pair of fisherman on the river the day he vanished.
Jaryd asked the men if there were bears in the area.
Jaryd supposedly walked away.
The Larimer County Sheriff never told Allyn about this development and allowed them to hear it on the radio.
Allyn was at the search headquarters at the trail head when two SAR workers came in and asked for a bag in a cupboard.
One of the canines needed Jaryd’s scent to work the area and the bag supposedly had a piece of his clothing.
Allyn grabbed the bag and looked inside and saw a pair of his own shorts.
He asked if this was the bag they were using for scent?
He was told that it was.
He asked how anyone could misinterpret a man’s pair of shorts for something a small three-year old boy would be wearing?
The SAR leader got up towards Allyn’ and stated: “We can call off the search right now.”
Allyn was had a discussion with SAR and sheriffs about the trail about any opportunity an abductor would have about escaping the valley without being noticed.
He was told by officials that there was only one way in and one way out of the river valley and that was via the Big South Trail head.
Allyn determined that this was entirely untrue.
Either the official was incompetent or lying.
The Atadero family had made inquiries to get the assistance from the FBI.
They were told that there was no evidence of a crime and the FBI would not get involved.
Four years later hikers were 500 feet above
the Big South Trail, over two miles from the trail head when they found scattered clothing.
Larimer County Sheriff was notified and deputies went to the scene and found remains that were consistent with Jaryd.
Allyn was called and they escorted him down the trail to the point just below the remains.
It was a very, very steep and rocky incline where two SAR workers helped him up the mountain.
He was taken to an area where they showed him where the sweatpants were found, but the clothing was already removed from the mountain.
He was taken to another location where Jaryd’s shoes were found.
The shoes were clean and the colors were vibrant.
Searchers also found the sweater Jaryd was wearing that had some unusual hairs
Crime scene technicians found the top of his skull and one tooth in the general area.
At a pres conference, Allyn noticed that someone had (pulled the pants to display them right-side out).
He asked the sheriff why they did that.
The sheriff asked him what he meant.
Allyn told them that when they were found, they were inside out.
The sheriff claimed ignorance to the pant issue.
At the press conference, the sheriff stated he wasn’t positive what happened to Jaryd.
He thought it was possible that a mountain lion killed him.
There wasn’t significant evidence to support that.
They didn’t find any blood on any of the clothing.
The CBI stated that the cranium had degraded DNA, but a DNA expert from Ohio told Allyn at a later date that the tooth was contaminated with more than one persons DNA.
They told Allyn that the hairs were found on Jared's clothes were not Mountain lion and not to worry about it.
They never gave Allyn the hair report and never told him what the hairs belonged to.
He was given the DNA report and every other imaginable report, but that one.
The lone tooth that was recovered that had compromised DNA.
Allyn got this response from the DNA lab he regarding the returns obtained on Jaryd’s tooth:
Hi Allyn,
"You have my sympathies regarding the search for your son.
There are two things about the information you provided to me that
strike me as being not quite right. First, a sample from a tooth
should not be a mixture (which means that it contains the DNA of two
or more individuals) if the tests and extractions were performed
correctly. At the very least, a mixture for such a sample would mean
that some contamination occurred and DNA testing labs are usually
very careful to avoid any possibility of contamination/mishandling of
samples. Second, the genetic markers that are used for the purpose
of human identification are called "loci" in the plural but an
individual marker is referred to as a "locus" (singular). While
attorneys and lay people are not sensitive to the difference between
the singular and plural form of that word, professionals who work in
DNA testing labs are almost always hyper-sensitive to it and rarely
use them incorrectly."
Jaryd’s personal items that were not found were the lower jaw, teeth, his T-shirt and underwear.
Jaryd never tied his shoes.
If something dragged him 500 feet up a rocky, steep incline, his shoes would be banging or dragging on the ground and would fallen off.
There were no scuff marks or significant scratches near the toes or the back of the shoes.
There was no mold inside the shoes or evidence that there had been significant snow and water on them.
Allyn was given all of Jaryd’s property, bones, skull, tooth, clothing and shoes.
Allyn contacted a group of mountain lion experts, explained the evidence that had been recovered and asked their opinion on what happened.
The opinion was that a mountain lion had not killed Jaryd.
This was based on a lack of serious damage to the sweater near the stomach and neck.
There are no new leads on the case.
