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An autopsy has identified human remains found along a Weber County hiking trail earlier this week as those of a 23-year-old Ogden woman who went missing about a month ago.
The official cause of death for Amber Lyne Smith remained to be determined by the State Medical Examiner's Office, but Sheriff's Lt. Lane Findlay said detectives continue to investigate the circumstances of the case as suspicious.
"It is believed that Amber went missing sometime around the first part of April of this year. She lived in the area where her body was found and was known to occasionally go hiking," Findlay said Wednesday.
Though she had not been seen for about four weeks, no one had official reported Smith missing, Findlay said.
"She had a roommate, and apparently there had been communications between [the roommate] and her friends and family that she was missing, but for whatever reason no one officially came forward to file a report," he said.
The badly decomposed body of the 5-foot-6, 125-pound brown-haired and brown-eyed woman was discovered Monday morning in thick brush by a mountain biker and his dog investigating a foul odor near 1500 N. Mountain Road.
Due to the ongoing nature of the investigation, the sheriff's office declined to discuss whether Smith had suffered any apparent physical trauma.
Investigators are asking anyone with information — including those who may have seen her in the area of the east Ogden foothills or its trails around the first part of April — to call detectives at 801-778-6638.
Twitter: @remims