A man in the state of the Washington center is sought under suspicion of murder after his three young daughters were reported as missing and then found dead.
The authorities asked the public on Tuesday for help to find Travis Decker, 32, who is loved for three positions of murder and kidnapping, according to the Wenatchee police, about 100 miles (160 kilometers) east of Seattle.
Police said it was unknown if Decker, a former army soldier with “extensive training,” was armed.
On Friday, the mother of the girls, aged 9, 8 and 5, reported that her father did not return them after a planned visit, police said.
During the weekend, the authorities looked for the children and Decker, who believed that he lived outside a GMC Sierra de GMC white truck with Washington plates.
Police said that Decker’s unemployed truck was found on Monday near a camp west of the city of Leavenworth, which is about 20 miles (30 kilometers) northwest of Wenatchee. The officers found the bodies of the girls during a search.
Any person who has seen Decker since Friday or knows that he was asked for his current location to call 911.
“Due to security concerns, don’t try to contact or approach Decker,” said the police.
He Wenatchee School District He said girls were Lincoln Elementary students. The advice services were available, and the district asked people to respect the privacy of students, staff members and families and come to the campus only for regular school businesses.
The mother told the Police that Decker picked up the girls around 5 in the afternoon, but had not returned them at 8 pm, and her phone was directly to the voice mail, according to a sworn statement of probable cause written by a detective of the Wenatchee police, The Seattle Times reported.
The detective said “she expressed concern because, according to reports, Decker has never done this before and … she is currently experiencing some mental health problems.”
“What led her to call us was that … she was late for the girls and had not communicated to her that she was going to be late, that it was her typical fashion and, therefore, this was out of the ordinary,” said Captain Brian Chance.
Washington’s state patrol was contacted on Friday night to request an Ambar alert, but did not comply with the required criteria, said Wenatchee police. The next day, Wanatchee’s detectives contacted the patrol with additional information that led to the issuance of a missing person alert in danger of extinction.
The lack of criteria was suspicious of kidnapping and imminent danger of death or serious injuries, said Chris Loftis, director of Public Affairs of the State Patrol.
“In this case, he was a father with custody privileges, and the children had not been returned home in time. But that is a fairly common occurrence and not something that only abduction would automatically assume,” he said, and added that there was no indication of Decker, a father with custody that the children had for a visit, would harm them.
“We are people too, you know, so the loss of a child, the loss of two children, the loss of three children is … devastating,” Loftis said. “Everyone always looks for how we can improve.”
Alert systems constantly evolve and this could cause one more change, Loftis said: “Obviously it did not work this time. Obviously we have three children who are dead.”
Decker and girls’ mother are divorced, said Chance. He had no details about how the girls were killed or about Decker’s employment.
Decker joined the Army in 2013 and transferred to the Washington National Guard in 2021, told The Associated Press, spokesman for the Washington military department, Karina Shagren. He was a full -time guard member until 2023 or 2024, when he changed part -time.
Decker stopped attending mandatory monthly drills just over a year ago, and the guard was in the process of a disciplinary discharge for him, Shagren said.
“This is an absolute tragedy,” Shagren said. “We are mourning along with the community.”
The Sheriff’s County Sheriff, which found the truck, led the search in the Okanogan Wenatchee national forest, while other teams followed the “potential credible information and advice” regarding Decker’s location, the agency said in a statement.
The agency was working with American bailiffs to locate and apprehend Decker. A reward of up to $ 20,000 was available for information that led directly to its arrest.
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Associated Press Lisa Baumann writer in Bellingham, Washington, contributed.
