A man was found dead and a woman was found severely dehydrated in rural San Diego County on Sunday afternoon, and they were later confirmed to be an Orange County couple that went missing on Mother’s Day, authorities said.
Firefighters responded about 2:34 p.m. to a call of an unconscious person on Lost Valley Road (map), northwest of Warner Springs, said Capt. Kendal Bortisser of Cal Fire’s San Diego division. The location is near the Schoepe Scout Reservation at Lost Valley.
The first responders arrived to find a deceased person and dehydrated woman, who was airlifted to Palomar Hospital, Boritisser said. Her condition was not immediately known.
Los Coyotes Indian Reservation police initially told San Diego County Sheriff’s Department officials that the two people found Sunday were possibly a couple that disappeared after a trip to a San Diego Casino on May 10, KTLA’s sister station KSWB reported.
The Sheriff’s Department later confirmed that the deceased man and hospitalized woman were Cecil “Paul” Knutson, 79, and Dianna Bedwell, 68. The cause of Knutson’s death was not immediately known.
The two Fullerton residents vanished two weeks ago after leaving the Valley View Casino & Hotel in Valley Center, where they were last seen on surveillance video. They had been expected to go to their son’s home in La Quinta for a Mother’s Day dinner, but never arrived.
“They left the casino and they were looking for a shortcut to get to their destination,” sheriff’s Lt. Ken Nelson said at a Sunday night news conference. “They became lost and their vehicle became trapped on this remote road out in the eastern part of the county.”
After the pair was found in a damaged car by a person on an off-road vehicle, Bedwell told investigators that after the couple’s car had broken down she and her husband drank rain water and ate some snacks they had with them, the Los Angeles Times reported.
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