"It's an ongoing nightmare," he said Sunday after authorities identified Ryan Thayn's body as the remains found Friday 6 feet into a 16-inch-wide crevice in Emery County. Ryan Thayn was 25 when he disappeared in 1998. Sheriff's deputies say he died of an accidental, self-inflicted gunshot wound that may have occurred while he was hunting.
The discovery ends a torturous, 10-year search kept alive by inaccurate tips that came in once or twice each month - one as recently as two weeks ago, said Emery County Sheriff Lamar Guymon.
"We've always been given information that he was down a mine shaft or he was in a landfill at East Carbon, or so-and-so was at a party and so-and-so said he killed Ryan Thayn," Guymon said.
Randy Thayn said he followed every new tip, no matter how dubious.
"You could hear scuttlebutt at any time, about one thing or another. We had a lot of psychics give us information on where they thought he was, and we'd run our tail off looking here and there every time one of them called," he said. "But you gotta check each one."
Shortly after Ryan Thayn disappeared, hundreds of volunteers assembled near his abandoned truck, about 2 miles from the crevice where his body was found Friday, according to Tribune archives. Although searchers scoured for several miles around the truck, Randy Thayn said, the terrain simply was too severe for them to find the body.
"We did the best we could at the time, and we just didn't find him," he said.
An oil and gas survey crew found the remains southeast of Wellington.
Authorities said there was no sign of foul play or that the gunshot wound was intentional.
"Ryan was an avid hunter, and it wouldn't be unusual for him to be out in the area he was in," Guymon said. "He went hiking on a regular basis, he was a taxidermist, he [hunted] coyotes. He was always out doing something."
When he died, Ryan Thayn was working three jobs and studying electrical engineering part time at the College of Eastern Utah in Price, his father said.
Funeral arrangements are pending.
