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PARIS, Idaho — Two teenagers from Utah on a family reunion at Bear Lake discovered part of a human jaw while building a sandcastle Thursday morning.
Matthew Durrant, 16, and his friend Ben Davis, 16, arrived at the beach with around 20 members of Matthew's family. Most of the group was going boating while others decided to stay on shore in the northeast area of the lake.
"We wanted to make a really big sandcastle, so we brought two metal shovels and our cousins were using their little plastic ones," Matthew told EastIdahoNews.com. "We had a 5-foot-wide circle going each way, about 2 feet deep."
As Matthew started to dig, Ben immediately noticed something unusual mixed in the sand with some seashells.
"He had scooped it up and put it to the side. He didn't realize what he had dug up but I looked at him and said, 'That looks like a jaw,'" Ben recalled.
A closer look revealed a lower jawbone with teeth still intact. Matthew estimates the bone was only buried around 6 inches below the surface. The teenagers called some family members over and took the jawbone to a shallow area of the lake to wash it off.
Matthew says his aunts and uncles were "freaking out" as Mark Durrant, Matthew's dad, tried to figure out if the remains were human.
"At first we thought it was probably an animal bone – maybe a deer or something like that. But then when we got closer and were able to see human teeth," Mark Durrant says. "It was obviously very clear that this is a human remain and we needed to do something."
At first we thought it was probably an animal bone – maybe a deer or something like that. But then when we got closer and were able to see human teeth.
–Mark Durrant
The family called The Bear Lake County Sheriff's Office. When deputies arrived, they took statements from the boys and closed off the portion of the beach where the remains were found.
Ben and Matthew say it's ironic because they initially started to build their sandcastle at a different spot.
"When we first got there, my dad started digging and I was like, 'No, I don't want to dig here.' I took a couple steps away and said, 'Let's dig right here,'" Matthew said. "I had this distinct feeling that we should dig right there. I don't know what it was. But I was like, that looks like a good place because it was close to the water."
The Bear Lake County Sheriff's Office is working with the Idaho State University Anthropology Department to examine the site and recover any other remains, according to a news release. The sheriff's office says it does not have any cold cases or missing people that may be linked to the jawbone.
Anthropology team called in to help collect, identify bones found on shore of Bear Lake
An anthropology team from Idaho State University and the Bear Lake County Coroner have been called in to help investigators recover and possibly identify human remains discovered on the Idaho side of Bear Lake.Bear Lake County Sheriff Bart Heslington said during a news conference Friday morning it's possible the remains may be multiple decades old.
"We're kind of researching, historically, beyond those timelines, which are probably 35 years, to see if we have any information about any other people who are potentially missing or may have gone missing on the lake," he said. "Outside of that, everything is under investigation."
Matthew's grandfather has a cabin at Bear Lake and the Lehi, Utah, family often visits the area. Before their discovery Thursday morning, the teenagers say they were joking about possibly finding buried treasure or dinosaur bones – never expecting they'd find part of a human.
"There's a body out there. This is someone's loved one, this is someone's brother, this is someone's sister. This belongs to someone. It's not just a bone," Matthew said.
Ben added, "It still hasn't fully set in that this is a person. You don't think about that at the moment … but this is a son or daughter that we want to help."
