Group of kids playing soccer discover human remains in West Valley
Apr 27, 2018, 10:26 PM | Updated: Apr 28, 2018, 1:13 am
WEST VALLEY, Utah – A group of children playing soccer went on hunt to find their lost ball, and discovered human remains instead.
“It was creepy, but at the same time it was exciting,” 9-year-old Celso Agular said.
Agular was one of five children, ages 5 to 13, playing soccer outside a trailer home near 2700 S. 2500 West, when the ball was kicked over a fence, he said.
“When we kicked it went all the way into the river,” Agular said.
That “river” was actually a canal that channels into West Valley’s Decker Lake. Agular and his friends said it looked like a “shoe with a bone sticking out of it,” but weren’t sure if it was real.
“We told our biggest brother. He said that it could be something from Halloween, and he didn’t believe us, so we didn’t tell anybody,” Agular said.
A couple of days later, Agular said he told his mother what he saw, and she went to investigate. She discovered the bones were real, then called 911, the 9-year-old said.
Officers responded and found what appeared to be human remains caught in a pile of debris in the middle of the canal, where the aqueduct flows under I-215 and feeds into Decker Lake, West Valley City Police Department spokeswoman Roxeanne Vainuku said.
The next day, on April 23, the Utah State Dive Team recovered the remains of what appeared to be an adult male, according to Vainuku. The Medical Examiner’s Office is working on a DNA match, and height and age range.
Detectives attempted to find any further remains a few days later with a cadaver dog team but did not find anything.
Agular said, “It’s actually good that we found it because… we helped them find someone that died.”
