Family says bodies found in SG Mts. burn area those of missing hikers

Authorities say they have found what appear to be the burned remains of two people in an area scorched by a major wildfire in the San Gabriel Mountains last month.

Los Angeles County Sheriff's officials said they found the remains in the Angeles National Forest near the city of Duarte Thursday night after a person in the area flagged down firefighters and reported seeing bodies.

Members of the San Dimas Mountain Rescue Team later found the remains.

A representative with the Los Angeles County Coroner's Office confirmed investigators were on scene today. The coroner has not confirmed the names of the deceased.

Los Angeles resident Ricardo Pardo told KPCC that he was the man who found the bodies, and he believes they were of his brother, 16-year-old Jonathan Pardo, and his cousin, 32-year-old Carlos Perez. While their bodies were burned beyond recognition, Pardo noticed a scorched backpack nearby which he said belonged to them. He said the two men were dropped off in the canyon to hike and fish on June 20 at 9 a.m. shortly before the fire broke out.

Pardo said his family traversed the mountains for two weeks, looking for his brother and cousin. He was critical of the response his family received from authorities, telling KPCC that officials from the Azusa PD, San Dimas Sheriff's station and LAPD did not do enough to help them find the men.

Lt. Mike Rosson of the L.A. County Sheriff's Department's homicide bureau defended the response by authorities, and said officials began looking for the hikers on June 23, as soon as a missing person's report was filed. Pardo said he reported the men missing on June 21, and that his family had bounced from various agencies with little information.

Rosson characterized the mountain search as a standard operation that followed appropriate protocol. He said it was not a 24-hour search because that kind of operation is uncommon. He said authorities attempted to ping a cell phone belonging to one of the men but got no reception to it, likely because of their remote location. A detective met with the family, and fire officials and transients in the national park were informed of the missing men. Foot crews were focused in the "lower canyon" area near Morris Dam since the men were believed to have gone fishing.

Rosson said the search was complex because the family did not know where the two men had been dropped off when they embarked on their hike. Without a starting point, Rosson said, search missions in the canyon area can be futile.

"It's hundreds of thousands of acres," he said.

This week the family learned from a friend that the men had been dropped off near the "upper canyon," Rosson said. A day later, they found the bodies.

Rosson said this part of the national park had been searched by air, not by foot.

Authorities could not confirm how the two men died, but a sheriff's statement says the remains were "significantly affected" by the fire. 

The blaze that broke out June 20 burned more than 80 square miles in the Angeles National Forest and forced the evacuation of some 1,300 homes in foothill communities northeast of Los Angeles.

This story has been updated