In August of 2016, 22-year-old Austin Griffin left his blue pickup truck in a parking lot near the Ice Lake Basin Trail in the San Juan Mountains.

A camera at the entrance to Silverton captured him at 7:00, 20 minutes in the morning.

A backpack behind his back, a quick movement toward the forest, a brief glance upward as if he heard something.

After that, there was no trace of him.

A year later, in August 2017, three cavers exploring a blind hole in the Copper Moon cave system found a man chained to the wall, exhausted but alive.

DNA analysis confirmed the name, Austin Griffin, a missing hiker who was supposed to return the next day.

How he ended up in a cave many miles off the trail and who kept him there for so long has not been determined.

On the first morning of his trip, August 15th, 2016, 22-year-old Austin Griffin left his rented townhouse on the outskirts of Denver at 6:00 20 minutes.

His roommate later recalled in the report that he heard a short, “I’ll be there tomorrow,” a common phrase when Austin was on his way to the mountains.

He was one of those who walked the trail confidently, light backpack, practiced movements, prepacked equipment.

The last signal of his phone, according to the operator, was recorded at 8:00 42 minutes when the car was moving along a mountain road in the Orai area.

After that, the device went silent.

In the San Juan Mountains, this is normal.

But on that occasion, the silence lasted too long.

At 6:00 in the morning, a gas station camera near Silverton captured a blue Toyota Tacoma pulling into the parking lot.

The video shows Austin getting out, grabbing a coffee, checking a map of the route, and quickly typing something on his phone, a message that never went anywhere due to the lack of network coverage.

The gas station employee told investigators that the guy was in a hurry and looked several times toward the clouds that were descending on the pass.

The weather was changing as the rangers also noticed.

Before lunch, storm clouds began to roll in near Ice Lake Basin, and the wind increased dramatically.

According to Austin’s entry in the visitor log at the beginning of the trail, he started the route at 7:00 27 minutes.

The entry was made in clear, straightforward handwriting.

2-day hike, return tomorrow.

It was one of the most popular trails in the San Juan Massie, but certain sections had a bad reputation among the locals.

In particular, narrow sections under rocky eaves where the overhangs often crumbled after a storm.

His pickup truck was captured on parking cameras at 11:00, 2 minutes later, parked neatly in the last row next to a sign about the instability of the ground on the ridge.

When he didn’t return on the evening of August 16th, his roommate first thought that Austin had simply stayed to take pictures of the lakes.

It was only the next day, after unsuccessful calls, that he contacted the Denver Police Department.

The officers, having received an official request to check his whereabouts, passed the information on to the San Juan County Sheriff.

The search operation began on August 17th at 7 in the morning.

The first group was two rangers who went up the main route to Ice Lake Basin.

They expected to see at least traces of an overnight stay, the remains of a campfire or marks on the ground.

But the trail was as clean as it had been after rain, which was confirmed by the weather report.

On the night of the 17th, there was a short but powerful downpour that could have washed away the tracks.

By noon, dogs joined the search.

They picked up the scent from the headrest of the pickup truck, but the trail only stretched for half a mile from the parking lot, after which it abruptly ended at a rocky area.

This was recorded in the K9 team’s protocol.

Approximate point of loss of scent, rocky scre, direction of travel uncertain.

The National Guard pilot, who took off at 14 hours and 20 minutes, stated that he had flown over the area north of the lakes and did not see any brightly colored equipment.

At an altitude between 12 and 15,000 ft, visibility was good, but the lower slopes were fogged with vapor from the rain.

The volunteers, who numbered more than 40 on the first day, worked until dark, combing through the offshoots of the route, including small canyons and an old landslide corridor where lost hikers had been found in the past.

Not a single detail that could be identified as belonging to Austin was found.

There were no signs of a fall, no torn gear, and no root map that he always carried in the side pocket of his backpack.

A fact confirmed by a colleague from the car dealership who had hiked with him on several occasions.

On the evening of August 17th, Griffin’s car was opened with his family’s permission.

Inside was an almost full tank of water, a road map, a spare raincoat, and a pair of dry socks.

the standard set that Austin always kept in case of emergency.

There were only two things missing, his backpack and his camera, which he almost never let go of.

The sheriff’s report stated that the car showed no signs of a struggle or haste.

Everything inside was lying around as if the owner had left for a few hours.

Over the next 2 days, the search was expanded to deeper gorges, including areas where old mining trails lay.

The dogs gave a weak reaction twice in the area of the filled-in tunnel, but after checking, it turned out that the scent belonged to another hiker who had passed through there a few days earlier.

All possible routes that Austin could have taken to try to shortcut the road were examined.

Not a single new trail appeared.

On August 19 at 9:00, the operation was officially put into passive search mode, meaning that active teams were withdrawn, but information was still being gathered.

The officer on duty posted a missing person’s report to the central database.

A record appeared in the system.

Lone hiker, experienced, route clearly defined, no return, no signs of falling.

His name was added to the list of those who had been taken by the San Juan Mountains without explanation.

And it was at this point that the first strange coincidence appeared in the case.

The last point where the dogs lost the trail was near a small chasm that the locals called a blind well.

According to the senior rangers, this ravine had a bad history.

They almost never found anything from there.

What exactly happened to Austin in the hours between the journal entry and his disappearance from the trail remains unknown, but even then, investigators wrote a brief note in the report.

The route is clear.

No outside interference was found.

The hiker disappeared without a trace.

This wording would return in their materials a year later after a new witness and a new place appeared in the mountains where the trail had not only broken off but had been erased by something much darker than rain.

On August 19, 2017, three amateur cavers from the Silverton Cavers Club set out to an unexplored part of the cave system that the locals call Copper Moon.

This area was not included in the official maps of the National Park Service.

The passageways there changed after every heavy rainstorm, and some of the corridors were too unstable to be safely recorded.

The club’s protocol states that the group’s departure was recorded at 8:00 40 minutes in the morning, and the route ran through the central hall, then into the southern corridor, which was previously considered a dead end.

The cabbers, two men and a woman, were moving slowly.

Already in the first hour of their passage, they noticed a pungent odor which they described as metallic and musty.

At 9:00 23 minutes, the group leader made a note in his field journal.

The smell had intensified, the air was colder, and the wall on the right had strange scratches, as if someone had been running a metal object over it for a long time.

These entries would later become key to establishing the exact time of their approach to the site.

When they reached the corridor, which in the old diagrams is marked as a narrow pocket, they saw long tracks in the dust on the floor, not human footsteps, but thin, even lines like chain marks stretching several meters deep.

The light of the flashlights caught a depression in the rock at the end of the passage and in it something they first took for a mannequin or an abandoned tourist training dummy.

Only when they got closer did they realize it was a person.

The body sat slumped over the wall.

A chain fixed with metal dowels was wrapped around his arms and chest.

According to the speliologists, the man was breathing barely noticeably.

His eyes were open but not focused.

There were deep parchment cracks on his skin, dust, and small particles of calsite in his hair.

One of the group members called the rescuers using an emergency radio module, the signal of which could be penetrated only after entering a wider section of the corridor.

This is recorded in the report of the rescue service dispatcher.

The call was received at 10:00 57 minutes.

The first to arrive was a group of rescuers from Silverton.

They entered the cave at 12:00 20 minutes.

The senior medic recorded the victim’s critically low body temperature, severe dehydration, and signs of prolonged confinement in conditions of limited mobility.

On his arms and legs, there were characteristic marks from tight metal restraints.

The man did not respond to the doctor’s questions, only sometimes repeated unclear syllables that did not look like words.

The report states, “See speech fragmented without logical connection, no contact.

It took almost an hour to free the body from the chains.

The dowels were driven so deeply that a portable stone cutter had to be used.

Speliologists reported that they had never seen anything like this in this corridor before.

There were no holes in the walls or traces of drilling.

The forensic team later confirmed that the metal clamps had been installed no more than a year ago.

The victim was brought to the surface at 14 hours 02 minutes.

The doctors noted sharp muscle spasms and short-term loss of consciousness, reactions typical for people who have been in the cold and dark for a long time.

During transportation, the man tried several times to cover his face with his hands as if reacting to daylight.

At Silverton Hospital, his condition was assessed as critically stable.

Laboratory tests showed severe anemia, salt deficiency, the effects of prolonged starvation, and numerous healed fractures of the ribs and right collarbone.

A psychiatrist who examined the man that evening noted, “Complete amnesia, zero orientation, anxious reaction to any attempts to touch.

The patient did not give his name, and did not respond to questions about the date or place.

Identification was made through a DNA match to the state’s database.

The match appeared in the system at 22 hours 46 minutes.

The name is Austin Griffin, a hiker who disappeared a year ago on the Ice Lake Basin Trail.

The investigation team’s report emphasized that the victim’s appearance was not consistent with a year in the wild.

His hair was not very long.

His nails were cut unevenly, but clearly not in a natural way, and there were fresh marks on his wrists from recent metal tightening that looked much younger than a year old.

A separate report was drawn up on the condition of the clothes.

The man was wearing a thin thermal jumpsuit, very dirty, but without tears.

The brand did not match any of the things Austin had with him when he went out on the route.

According to his neighbor and the data from the equipment log, this meant that he had been given the clothes after his disappearance.

In the corridor of the Copper Moon, where Austin was found, forensic experts found small fragments of metal, parts of a chain that did not belong to the fixation structure, and a ceramic fragment, probably from a mug.

There were traces of soot on it.

A chemical examination was ordered, but the preliminary conclusion was that the object had been brought into the cave no earlier than a few months ago.

All three speliologists who came across him gave the same testimony.

The man was sitting motionless.

His breathing was barely noticeable.

His eyes were directed through the people and there was a complete absence of any personal belongings.

They also emphasized that the chains were not covered with dust, which is typical for deep cave compartments, so they must have been touched recently.

The question that appeared in the investigative department’s report that evening was brief and direct.

How exactly did a person who disappeared on a popular hiking trail miles away from this cave system end up trapped in a place with no obvious natural access? The documents sent to the state attorney general’s office include an additional note.

Traces of third-p partyy action are probable.

It was this wording that marked the moment when the story of the missing tourist first became a criminal case.

An official criminal case was opened on the third day after Austin Griffin’s hospitalization regarding his disappearance and now his recovery.

The detective of the San Juan County Sheriff’s Department, Randall Moore, received the materials around 9:00 and held a brief meeting with the group that had previously been searching for tourists in the Silverton area that evening.

The main direction of the investigation was clearly defined to check all local residents of the mountainous suburbs who might have access to remote cave systems or had knowledge of illegal tunnels, mine passages, and forgotten quaries.

First on the list were those whom local rangers called hermits.

They had been living in the mountains for years with little or no contact with others, often changing their sleeping places and knowing the landscape well.

Investigators immediately paid particular attention to the area of the abandoned Crow Rock quarry located a few miles from where the dogs had lost their trail during the long-standing search.

This quarry had its own sad history.

Back in the9s, there were several incidents with illegal miners and then the place began to decay.

It was there that Earl Granger lived.

Granger was about 60 years old.

He used to work as a minor in the Durango region and had a solid background in underground mining.

After a back injury, he quit his job, sold his house, and moved to the mountains where he lived in an old trailer without electricity.

There were a dozen conflicting stories about him.

One ranger mentioned in a report that Granger had repeatedly chased away hikers who happened to stumble upon his property and once even threatened them with a rifle.

Others said he only growls but doesn’t bite.

At the time of Griffin’s disappearance, investigators questioned him but found no evidence.

Detective Moore visited Granger in the morning after new information about the cave emerged.

According to the detective himself, the trailer was standing on a rocky rise with metal pipes, old buckets, and rusty hardware lying next to it, all of which could be remnants of mining equipment.

During the interrogation, Granger was tense, kept his hands in his jacket pockets, and often repeated that it is better to walk in the mountains for those who understand where they are going.

He denied any contact with Austin and categorically refused to let investigators into the trailer, allowing them to inspect only the area around it.

The detectives did not have sufficient grounds to search the trailer, so they had to settle for superficial photographs of the area and a description of the condition of the house.

However, the investigator’s note was unequivocal.

Behavior is suspicious, nervous, possibly hiding foreign objects.

Another suspect was Michael Thornton, a logger who lived a mile from Granger’s trailer.

Thornton was well known in the local bar community, loud, prone to fights, and had been cited several times for disorderly conduct.

According to the owner of a store in Aray, Thornton often expressed disgust with tourists, calling them superfluous and repeatedly saying that it should be quiet in the mountains.

When the detectives arrived, Thornton greeted them aggressively.

according to one of the detectives with a glint in his eye as if he was expecting trouble.

He refused to answer some of the questions was defiant and when it came to Copper Moon, he immediately lowered his voice and said that he doesn’t stick his nose where it doesn’t belong.

The investigators entered this phrase into the protocol without interpretation, but put a note next to it.

High probability of awareness of illegal or restricted areas.

The inspection of the areas around Gringanger and Thornton’s homes did not yield anything obvious.

A pile of old chains were found at Gringer’s place, but most were so rusty that they could not be used in the cave.

Thornton kept some ropes, hooks, and ropes in a shed that investigators believed could be used in mining operations.

However, none of the items matched the samples recovered from the site where Griffin was found.

These days, investigators have also reached out to residents of an old community on the slope of Red Mountain, where several families have lived since the early 2000s who refused to move after the mines closed.

They had repeatedly seen strangers spending the night in the woods and visiting abandoned passages.

One of the old-timers told detectives that a year before the discovery, he had seen two men in dark jackets walking to the entrance of one of the caves late at night.

He was unable to describe their faces, but noted that they did not look like tourists.

They moved confidently, stayed off the paths, and knew where they were going.

This information was added to the case, although it did not provide a specific direction.

A separate block of checks concerned illegal mineral miners who sometimes worked in the Verona Scala area.

Their routes ran close to a number of entrances to additional branches of the underground systems.

The sheriff received information from the Geological Survey.

Several mine passages remained legally closed, but fresh bootprints had been found there before.

Only a limited number of people had access to the lists.

Former miners, smugglers, and seasonal workers.

Among these people, about 16 names stood out, but there was no direct evidence or material matches.

Detectives set up covert surveillance of Gringanger and Thornton.

Reports from the first three days showed that Granger left the trailer only twice to fetch water from the creek and to get firewood.

Thornton, on the other hand, spent almost the entire day in the woods, sometimes disappearing near the old quarry for an hour or two, but there was no activity that would indicate his presence in the cave or contact with the underground passages.

Detective Moore noted in an internal memo that both men could well have known about the remote corridors of Copper Moon, having spent their entire lives in these places.

However, neither the chains nor the fasteners nor the clothing items found on Austin matched what was on the suspect’s property.

This meant one thing.

Either they were not involved or their involvement was well concealed.

Despite the absence of direct traces, Granger and Thornon were left under active surveillance.

The detectives realized that someone knew the caves, their dead-end branches, and ways to disguise the entrances.

Locals were the natural first candidates, and although no evidence was yet available, their names remained at the top of the list.

At the same time, the investigation began to notice a disturbing trend.

In all three areas they checked, people talked about the caves as if there was something there, but no one dared to specify what it was.

Only one of the old miners said in a half-hearted voice as he was leaving the police station, “There are places where it is better not to go for a long time, because if someone lives there, they don’t want to be seen.

” This phrase was recorded without comment, but included in the report as a possible indication of additional unidentified persons in the mountainous area.

An expanded search in the area of the Verona Scalia Quarry began on the third day after the interrogation of local residents.

The quarry itself is located on the southern slope of the Massie, a few miles from official hiking trails.

The road there is old, broken, and in some places almost completely overgrown.

The rangers recorded that the vehicles could only reach the upper plateau, and the group moved on foot.

The place had a reputation for danger.

People had fallen into old mine voids here many times, and the surrounding slopes were considered unstable after ancient mining operations.

The first discovery was a dilapidated watchhouse that had long been marked as unusable on area maps.

It stood on the edge of the quarry site leaning against a cliff and was partially covered with rock debris.

Detectives described it as a wooden and metal structure with a cavedin roof and walls that were rotten from moisture.

There was little light inside, but it was clear that someone had been here recently.

On the table were two tin cans of canned food, both unlabeled, opened with a knife in an uneven cut.

According to a forensic scientist who examined the scene, one of the cans had food residue that had dried less than a few days ago.

Nearby were two sleeping bags piled in a corner.

The fabric was worn but dry, which could mean that they had been brought in after the last rains or that someone had stayed here for a short period of time.

There were also shoe marks on the floor, fuzzy but recognizable by their treads as the soles of heavy boots, probably work boots.

The forensic expert concluded that at least two people had been in the building no more than a week ago.

The marks on the walls attracted the most attention.

On several board panels, someone had carved out sketchy animal shapes in short strokes with a knife, resembling marks of a successful hunt.

One of the walls had a series of vertical notches.

Some were new, still light, some darkened, as if they had been made years earlier.

An expert from the sheriff’s department noted that this type of notching could have been used to count the days or mark the number of prey.

The report notes, possible personal records, but no value has been established.

Contrary to expectations, no items that could be linked to Austin Griffin were found in the building.

There was no equipment, clothing fragments, documents, or equipment.

DNA samples from cans and sleeping bags did not match his profile.

This was confirmed in a laboratory report by the state police.

However, the place looked as if someone was hiding or using the premises as a staging area, which worried the investigation the most.

The inspection of the area around the quarry lasted until dusk.

The dogs picked up a faint trail in the direction of one of the abandoned mine entrances, but the scent was vague and quickly lost in the damp stone floor.

This tunnel, marked on the official map as dangerous, no entry, was blocked after a collapse more than 20 years ago.

But despite the warnings, fresh bootprints led there.

The detectives assumed that someone had used the old passage as a hiding place or had used it to get to the lower levels of the quarry, but it was impossible to move further because the stones blocked the passage completely.

Meanwhile, the alibi checks of Earl Granger and Michael Thornton yielded the first results.

On the day the Cavers found Austin, Granger was at the market in Silverton, which was confirmed by the store’s camera footage and the testimony of a shop assistant who recognized him by his old leather hat jacket.

At the same time, Thornton was working at a wood lot with a crew.

Three workers confirmed that he did not leave the group until late in the evening.

Although both versions did not exclude the possibility of there having been in the quarry earlier at the time of the cave’s discovery, these alibis were considered partially reliable.

Despite the lack of a direct connection to Austin, detectives noted that the watch house itself could be relevant to understanding the movements of the unknown persons.

The investigative team’s notes indicate that someone regularly used the quarry as a temporary base.

The presence of food scraps, traces of overnight camping, and new notches in the walls indicated activity that coincided with the period when Austin disappeared and when he could have been held.

But without concrete evidence, all of this remained a hypothesis.

One detail in particular alarmed the investigators.

On the far wall under a layer of dust, they found a medium-sized bone with scratched lines on it.

The expert preliminarily identified it as an animal bone, possibly a deer.

The lines resembled the same notches that were on the wooden panels.

When the bone was removed for examination, it turned out that the pattern was fresher than the ones on the walls, having been made no more than a few months ago.

The quarry began to be considered as a possible point where those involved in the abduction might have come to or known about.

The building looked like a place where they were preparing for something or waiting for someone, not just hiding.

Investigators came to an intermediate conclusion.

If those involved in Griffin’s capture were not among the local hermits, they could have been operating in an area they knew well.

And it was the quarry with its abandoned mines, old corridors, caverns, and numerous hidden passages that became the first material starting point for the investigation, which could lead to those who moved through the mountains unnoticed.

After a series of unsuccessful interrogations and inspections of the foothills, the investigation was effectively in a vicious circle.

The reports of the fourth and fifth days of inspections contained the same conclusions.

No direct evidence of foul play.

Suspicions of hermits not confirmed.

Footprints found in the quarry area not related to the victim.

In his memo, Detective Moore noted that it was necessary to go back to the period immediately preceding Griffin’s disappearance and check everything that might have seemed unimportant in the early days.

It was at this point that the department received a call from an employee of the San Juan Outfitters store in Silverton.

The man said he remembered a customer whose behavior didn’t fit the usual tourist patterns.

The testimony record states that the customer came into the store the day before Austin stopped contacting him.

He chose a set of items that according to the witness had nothing to do with hiking.

Heavy metal chains, several large carabiners, two wide slings, tourist type wrist cuffs, and several packages of anti-depressants.

The witness emphasized that such purchases are made either by equipment repairmen or people who do not intend to travel.

The payment was in cash.

According to the report, the buyer hardly spoke, acted quickly, and looked back several times before walking out the door.

Thanks to the precise time frame between 6:00 and 7 in the evening, investigators were able to retrieve video from the store’s surveillance cameras.

The footage clearly showed an old khaki SUV.

It stopped at an angle, avoiding the direct camera angle and was only partially in the frame.

The car had non-standard off-road tires with aggressive treads, which are usually used for driving on unstable rocky terrain.

The buyer himself entered the frame, a thin man in a dark jacket with his head down and packages in his hands.

It was not possible to see his face as it was hidden by the shadow of the awning and the low slope of his chin.

In the video, he enters the store, comes out a few minutes later, and quickly gets into a car.

The SUV drives off without pausing.

The analytical group noted that the customer’s behavior was structured and purposeful.

The time spent in the store was short, the choice of items was accurate, and the movements were without unnecessary delays.

The official commentary noted, “The subject acted according to a pre-prepared plan.

” During the same period, the department received the results of the analysis of a ceramic fragment found in a dead-end branch of the Copper Moon Cave.

Experts identified seven key features, among which the most important was the origin of the fragment.

It belonged to the branded table wear of the Rocky Canyon restaurant in Ara.

This was confirmed by the shape of the logo, the glaze, and the composition of the pottery, which is typical for this particular batch.

The second important detail was that the shard had fresh soot marks on it, indicating contact with an open fire shortly before the object was brought into the cave.

Experts also noted that the fragment could not have been in the underground cavity for a long time.

There were almost no calcium deposits along the edges, typical of the deeper zones of the San Juan.

This meant that the object had entered the cave recently at a time close to the time when Austin Griffin was held there.

By combining the data on the purchase of technical and deterrent items in Silverton with information on the origin of the ceramics from array, the investigation obtained the first outline of the John Doe’s movements.

He crossed the territory between the two cities, had access to remote areas of the mountains, and used items not associated with a casual tourist.

The analytical department labeled this coincidence with a separate wording.

The subject is mobile, acts in advance, moves between urbanized and inaccessible areas, has access to household and technical facilities, which is not typical for casual travelers.

For the first time in the case, it was suggested that Griffin’s abduction may not have been a spontaneous act, but part of a prepared chain of events in which the unknown person clearly planned the movement, purchase, and use of items in different parts of the San Juan Mountains.

Once the origin of the ceramic shur was determined, the investigation focused on finding those who might have seen the person regularly traveling between Orurel and the San Juan Mountains.

Detective Moore noted in his memo that the main task was to check on anyone who might have had contact with non-ourists who used the routes through the mountain towns.

The first person on the list was the owner of the Rocky Canyon restaurant.

According to him, the mugs from the old batch did occasionally fall into the hands of visitors, but only those who asked for coffee on the go.

He recalled one man who appeared in the restaurant irregularly, but for several years he did it the same way.

He came in quickly, ordered coffee without food, took it in a ceramic mug, and left without lingering.

The owner emphasized that this man was always alone, wore a dark jacket, and his face looked like someone who worked outside for a long time.

The main detail was that he would get into an old khaki SUV which he sometimes parked in the back lot.

The owner did not know his name, but noted that he never acted like a traveler.

The investigators then went to the car repair shops.

At Durango Motors, a mechanic who had worked there for many years immediately recognized the described car.

He confirmed that he was servicing an old Ford Bronco from the late8s repainted in a matte dry grass color.

Modifications to the car included a reinforced suspension and non-standard off-road tires, which are installed for driving on unstable, rocky terrain.

The mechanic recalled that the driver always behaved the same way.

He stayed close to the car, didn’t talk too much, and paid for the work in cash.

And most importantly, he recalled the name the driver had mentioned during one of his visits.

It was Douglas Crawford.

A background check revealed that Crawford was a former mining engineer who had worked on rock stability assessments and surveys of old mine corridors in the San Juan Mountains.

A year before Austin’s disappearance, he quit his job, changed his address to a private mailbox, and stopped maintaining any social contacts.

The documents indicated that he knew about side drifts and ventilation passages that are not shown on modern maps.

Another important testimony came from National Park Ranger Samuel Hart.

He said he had seen the same Ford Bronco repeatedly in areas where traffic is prohibited.

The report states that the car appeared on old technical entrances to abandoned mine entrances.

Hart emphasized that the driver never drove randomly.

He chose routes that could only be known to those who had access to old engineering documentation.

The ranger also described the nature of the movement.

The car did not rush, did not loop, but moved confidently, as if the owner knew the limits of dangerous slopes better than anyone.

To check the routes the car could have used, investigators turned to archival mining maps.

They found evidence of what Hart had said.

There were old maintenance corridors and drifts within a few miles of the sectors where the Bronco was spotted.

They were labeled as partially collapsed, but an experienced person would know which ones were still accessible.

Based on the testimonies, the analytical department formed a generalized profile.

Middle-aged man drives an old SUV, has access to old technical structures, avoids social contact, operates within the Aurel Silverton mountainous mining areas triangle.

It was the combination of three sources, a restaurant owner, a mechanic, and a ranger that first allowed the investigation to link a specific person to a route that led from cities to the most remote technical entrances of the San Juan Mountains.

After the mechanic at the Durango Motors Service Center named the owner of the modified SUV, the investigation checked all available data on Douglas Crawford.

Only a post office box was listed in the state registers, but an old certificate of rental of office housing issued to him during his mining operations was found in the archive of the technical inspection.

It mentioned a hut on the outskirts of the former technical corridor that had not been formally dregistered.

This became the basis for the operational team’s departure and subsequent search.

The cabin was located off the main trails in an area that had not been visited by tourists or local services for a long time.

From the outside, the house looked abandoned.

A sloping roof, an overgrown path, and cracked window frames.

Inside, however, the conditions were not indicative of an accidental stay, but of systematic use.

The detectives noted that the space was organized with a precision rarely seen in temporary shelters.

Things were folded into separate sections.

Tools were sorted by function, and the work surface was cleaned as if it were prepared for precise measurements.

On the wall opposite the entrance was a large topographic map of the San Juan Massie.

An official report noted that it contained dozens of small markings, most of which did not match official data.

Some of them reflected old mine entrances.

Others were technical passages that had long been decommissioned.

Some of the markings were accompanied by abbreviations similar to the internal system of marking the depth and passibility of the drifts.

Among them was copper moon marked with a symbol that experts described as a conventional designation of an accessible side entrance.

A number of photographs were found next to the map.

Most of them depict Austin Griffin at different times during his captivity.

In some he was sitting leaning against a rock wall.

In others, he was standing, leaning on a chain fastened high above his head.

Some shots were taken in such a way that the face was not fully visible, as if the photographer deliberately avoided direct contact.

Experts concluded that the photos could record the physical and psychological state of the prisoner for a long time.

All the photos were arranged in a strict sequence and some of them had conventional symbols on the back identical to those on the map.

A thick hardcover notebook was found on the table.

It contains entries made in the same handwriting without dates but organized thematically.

The protocol indicates that the key sections contained extensive notes on survival experiments, long-term reactions of the body under conditions of restriction, and behavioral characteristics of isolated subjects.

The texts do not mention any names, but one section describes an object that demonstrates non-standard resilience.

This designation obviously refers to Griffin.

There were repeated phrases in the notes including victims of an isolated civilization, the need for selection, the resilience of the body as a negation of the weakness of the environment.

Several paragraphs are devoted to the choice of people for observation.

According to the analysis, the author considered lonely tourists to be the most vulnerable category, calling them the weakest link of civilization.

The fragments of text placed next to each other refer to the need to test the boundaries which in its structure resembles experimental procedures.

On the inside of the cover was a short text.

The object should not know the goal.

Behavioral analysis experts noted that this phrase is typical of people with controlling tendencies who prefer complete isolation of victims.

In several places, the author described the captivity by the base as an observation phase that lasted until the limit was reached.

A box with dozens of empty packages of medicines was found on a shelf near the desk.

Most of them were sedatives, drugs that suppressed the stress response and artificial sleep aids.

According to the experts, these could have been means of controlling the prisoner’s condition.

Some of the packages had scratches and scuff marks as if they had been opened in the dark or in a hurry.

All serial numbers were cut out or erased with sandpaper.

In the far corner of the shack were metal containers with tools for working in underground conditions, hand winches, steel cables, anchor bolts, and old battery lamps.

Much of the equipment showed signs of active use.

Scratches, notches, and traces of heat treatment were visible on the metal.

The cables were rolled into tight spirals as if they were being prepared for transportation or securing heavy objects.

According to a technical expert, some of the kits could have been used to fix a person in the uneven surface of the caves.

Sealed bags with personal belongings were found in a small closet, including a separate bag with clothing items belonging to unknown people.

Some items were washed but showed signs of wear, while others were in a state as if they had been removed by force.

On several of the fabrics, microparticles of rock were found that correspond to the geology of the deeper parts of the San Juan Mass.

This became one of the key pieces of evidence of Crawford’s systematic actions.

Special attention of the investigation was drawn to an entry on one of the notebook pages made by another more confident hand.

It consisted of only one line.

He is stronger than I thought, but everyone has their limits.

Experts assumed that this phrase referred to Griffin as it appeared in a section describing the prisoner’s reactions to prolonged physical and psychological isolation.

Next to it was another short symbol that looked like a marker for changing the stage of observation.

As a result, the collected materials created a complete picture.

Crawford did not act impulsively.

He approached everything systematically, treating people as objects and remote areas of the mountains as a space for experiments in which isolation was the main tool.

Documents, photographs, and recordings showed that he was not just holding people.

He studied, recorded, evaluated, and compared.

His motives did not contain any emotional component, only a desire to observe the limits of human survival in conditions of complete loss of control over space.

After Douglas Crawford was detained on the emergency section of the old service road during a routine inspection, the investigation was able to document his explanations.

All reports indicate that he testified calmly without signs of pressure or emotion.

His wording was precise, concise, and logical with no deviations or attempts to diminish his own involvement.

In the first interrogation, Crawford admitted to the abduction and detention of Austin Griffin.

He confirmed that he had acted alone and specifically clarified that he had not involved any unauthorized persons in the abduction or transfer.

The protocol emphasizes explained that there was no interaction with other people.

He answered clarifying questions about his motives with wording that did not contain a psychological assessment, only a technical statement.

According to the interrogation reports, Crawford consistently outlined Griffin’s route of travel after the disappearance.

He described three locations where he held the victim until he was taken to the Copper Moon Cave.

Interrogation protocol number one records that Crawford took Griffin to the area of an old ventilation shaft.

The detainee explained that this cavity was used as a place of primary isolation because it had one entrance, was easy to control, and was off the tourist routes.

The rationale for the choice of location is presented in purely technical terms: accessibility, lack of unauthorized persons, and natural acoustic isolation.

According to Crawford, Griffin stayed at this location for a short time.

In the report of interrogation number two, he noted that he then moved Griffin to a side adat located between two closed technical entrances.

His explanation was that this location was chosen because of the availability of anchor points and the ability to keep the chain stable in an uneven environment.

He described the drift as a place suitable for fixation and observation.

The investigation later confirmed this forensically.

Scuff marks on the walls and fragments of canning containers matched items found in his cabin.

In interrogation protocol number three, Crawford explained that the Copper Moon Cave was chosen as the final location.

He described it as safe from intruders and sufficient for long-term detention.

According to him, it was the blind section of the cave that was key.

It had a narrow passage, difficult terrain, and no alternative exits, which ensured complete control over the space.

When asked about the purpose of the move, Crawford answered with a term that is recorded in the protocol as final phase of fixation.

He described all of these locations without assessing the moral component using technical terms typical of specialists in his field.

The protocols do not record any attempt to explain the reasons for Griffin’s choice or the significance of his actions in a broader context.

The investigation noted that Crawford’s answers were comprehensive in terms of logistics and completely lacking in terms of motives.

During a separate interrogation, Crawford provided explanations for the time periods.

He confirmed that he moved the victim between locations at intervals that he determined on his own without specifying the criteria.

He did not specify the duration of each stage, but the experts compared his words with forensic findings.

The footprints in the mine corresponded to several weeks.

The footprints in the drift to a short period, and the conditions in the cave indicated a stay that could last several months.

There is no mention in the minutes of Crawford expressing doubt or hesitation.

His testimony was in the nature of a report with no signs of internal struggle or excuses.

The psychological examination noted no emotional reactions to his own description of events which is also recorded in the final document.

Crawford gave only general statements about his motives.

Several protocols state indicated that he acted for his own reasons which he did not consider necessary to disclose.

When asked about his choice of victim, he did not provide information that would allow us to link Griffin to any previous conflict, interest, or personal history.

As a result, the motive was classified as not established.

After receiving the confessions, the investigation completed a technical reconstruction of the events, but a number of key questions remained unanswered.

Crawford did not explain the logic of moving between the three locations, did not specify whether he intended to hold Griffin longer, and did not provide any explanation of the criteria for choosing the locations.

Formally, the case was closed after the confession was secured.

However, the final report of the investigating department stated that the full picture of motives has not been established and a number of details were lost beyond recovery due to the victim’s lack of memories and Crawford’s unwillingness to explain the internal reasons for his actions.

Thus, the main events were reconstructed only through his own confessions, but they created the biggest void.

All the actions described, specific, structured, and technically sound, were never explained why they were committed.