Decker manhunt slows as costs climb; deputies stretched thin in hunt for accused child killer

As the weeks-long manhunt for Travis Decker stretches into summer, the pressure is mounting—not just from rugged terrain in the Cascade Mountains, but from the growing strain on law enforcement.

Deputies are being stretched thin, juggling the high-stakes search for a dangerous fugitive accused of killing his three young daughters with day-to-day police duties, emergency calls, and rising operational costs for an already expensive investigation that has yielded no new clues about Decker’s whereabouts beyond DNA found at the crime scene.

Challenges of splitting deputies’ time with Travis Decker case

Chelan County Sheriff Mike Morrison told KIRO Newsradio, Thursday, his office has faced challenges splitting deputies’ time on the search for Decker and performing other duties, from daily patrols to summer search and rescue efforts.

“We know that we are an international tourist destination when it comes to climbing, recreating, hiking, and we’re usually dealing with well over 100 search and rescues every single year, which are logistically challenging,” Morrison explained.

In a press release issued Wednesday, the Chelan Sheriff’s Office exemplified its time management challenges with a recent rescue of a Seattle woman who fell hiking in the Enchantments and injured her shoulder, requiring a helicopter rescue.

“Sheriff Mike Morrison reports, in addition to the ongoing search for Travis Decker, the need for backcountry rescue continues,” Chelan Operations Chief Randy Moody stated in the release.

Morrison also pointed to staffing challenges that have led to scrambling to make sure they had enough deputies for their search and other duties.

“We have individuals on light duty; those are out on FMLA or paid family medical leave. And we also have contractual obligations, which is unique to our agency this year, that it’s mandated that a certain amount of people have to be off at one time, yet the union has not agreed to allow us to have mandatory overtime,” Morrison said. “That leaves us with very few people at times on the road answering those calls while you’re also trying to do a search and rescue. And that’s why we tried to highlight it in our press release, that despite those challenges, our agency continues to show up, continues to do the work, and we’ve done a good job.”

Increasing costs in the search for Travis Decker

Morrison said the increasing costs of the search for Decker are also an issue that soon could come to a head for his office and other agencies.

While he is still in the process of adding up bills for fuel for patrol vehicles, dirt bikes, quads and side-by-sides, helicopters and helicopter maintenance, overtime, equipment, and other needs, he shared, “In talking with King County, Snohomish County, and Spokane County I believe they were all well over a million dollars assisting us, and that was just over a week.”

During the first week of search operations, those counties sent deputies, tactical teams, and search and rescue equipment, including their own helicopters and crews, to Chelan County.

The search has also included teams from five different U.S. government agencies, from the FBI to U.S. Marshals, that have taken over search operations and dedicated their Rapid Response Team—a team that trains for quick apprehension of fugitives—to the effort.

Earlier this week, for the first time since their manhunt began, investigators acknowledged the possibility that the father accused of killing his young daughters, Paityn, Evelyn, and Olivia, may have died in the wilderness, and they are now modifying part of their search into a recovery effort.

Thursday, Morrison revealed DNA found at the campground where the bodies of Paityn, Evelyn, and Olivia Decker were discovered matched Travis Decker’s DNA. However, Morrison said all of the many items collected by tactical teams at makeshift campsites high up in the Cascades, from near Leavenworth to Blewett Pass and Kittitas County, tested negative for a DNA match.

Chelan County Sheriff says lone hiker may have been person who failed to pay for camping

For the first time, Thursday, Morrison also said the lone hiker spotted running from a law enforcement helicopter near Colchuck Lake in the Enchantments just days into their search, may have instead been a hiker who may have failed to pay for an overnight camping pass and ran because he thought he’d get in trouble.

Morrison and others, however, have no plans to give up their search for Decker. Even after the early momentum in the search for a suspected killer is slowing, Morrison vowed to find Decker, no matter how long it would take to bring him to justice and help bring closure to friends and family of the three girls.

“We recognize that this could be a long game. We don’t give up,” Morrison said. “But it may have to be something that we start to step our resources back just to make sure we’re being responsible with them, and that if more comes up that gives us a lead, we’ll go back out and we’ll hit it as hard as we have been.”

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