June 13, 2018
From IdahoStatesman.com
Two days after Reece Rollins’ body was found in the Selway River in Idaho’s wilderness, Koby Clark’s body was discovered Thursday, authorities said, meaning two of the four hunters who went missing after an early-morning crash in May are still unaccounted for.
Rollins’ body was located in the Selway River east of Lowell in Idaho County, according to an Idaho County Sheriff’s Office news release. His body was found near Cupboard Creek above Selway Falls. A hiker in the area saw the body and passed on the information to the nearby U.S. Forest Service trail crew.
Clark’s body was found about 6 miles east of Lowell in the Selway River, the Sheriff’s Office said.
Two Bear Air Rescue, a search and rescue company based out of Whitefish, Montana, was requested to retrieve Rollins’ body, which was partially submerged. Two Bear Air then transported Rollins’ body to Sheriff’s Office personnel, who transported him to Trenary Funeral Home in Kooskia.
Clark’s body also was transported to Trenary Funeral Home.
Rollins’ stepsister Taylie Hammack initially posted the news of Reece Rollins’ body’s discovery on the “Finding Reece Rollins” Facebook page Wednesday evening.
“They found him last night. The Forest Service was the one who found him … (the body) was 45 miles down the river from where the accident happened,” Hammack told the Statesman on Wednesday evening.
Hammack said dental records and Rollins’ tattoo confirmed his identity, and the family was informed Wednesday. An autopsy was performed on his body in Boise, according to the news release. Hammack said the body was discovered Tuesday night.
“While we are grateful that we get to bring Reece home, our hearts are broken, both for the loss of Reece and for the families that are still waiting to find their loved ones,” Reece’s father, Albert Rollins, told the Statesman in an email. “If closure ever comes, it won’t be until all of the young men are able to be returned home with their families as well. Our desire from the beginning was to find all four young men, and that remains our plan.”
Rollins, 21, of Terrebonne, Oregon, and Clark, 21, of Bozeman, Montana, were on a bear-hunting trip with four others in the Bitterroot wilderness. They were out in the middle of the night because they heard wolves and left camp to go hunt them, Rollins’ father told the Statesman, and that’s when their Suburban rolled into the river.
The two hunters who remain missing are brothers Raymond P. Ferrieri, 24, and Jesse A. Ferrieri, 21, both of Mahapac Falls, New York.
Two other men in the truck, Georgians Jesse Gunin and Jason Lewis, ages unknown, escaped the swift river and are home.
Hammack said she and her family are going to help authorities search for the three remaining hunters.
“It still doesn’t seem real yet,” Hammack said. “But we are going back out with the search crew … to find the other boys.”
In his email to the Statesman, Albert Rollins said he wants to remember his son for many things, among them his “big smile.”
“There’s so much to say about Reece,” he wrote. “… He wasn’t afraid to go after what he wanted. He was living his dream. He was the best son a father could ask for. He loved God, life, the outdoors, his family and his many friends. Everything he did, he did so well, and I am so very proud to be his father.”