When officers and cadaver dogs finished their search of a Marion County property about 5 p.m. Wednesday with no significant finds, Chuck Cox thanked the crews, got into a car and felt that familiar sense of disappointment wash over him.
Cox, the father of missing Utah mother Susan Cox Powell, had hoped that the tip he received four or five months ago would finally lead searchers to his daughter's body and establish what happened to her since her December 2009 disappearance made national headlines.
Utah's West Valley City Police, who have led the investigation into Susan Powell's disappearance, offered few details about what prompted this week's search. But Cox described the information in an email and in a phone interview with The Oregonian.
He said the tipster had told him about the remote property in Scotts Mills, which had previously been rented by relatives of Josh Powell, Cox's son-in-law. The tipster said the relatives had hosted a large family gathering, which Josh and Susan Powell had attended.
Cox had long suspected Josh Powell in Susan Powell's disappearance, even before Josh Powell killed himself and the couple's two young children in February 2012.
The location made sense to him. It was in Oregon -- outside of the logical places that authorities would have checked, Cox thought.
Josh's brother, Michael, said in a deposition with Cox's attorney in a civil proceeding that he had had a car towed to Oregon, Cox said. Three months ago, Michael Powell jumped to his death from a seven-story building in Minneapolis.
Cox collected the information from the tipster and forwarded it to West Valley City Police. A spokesman for the Utah department did not return calls for comment on Friday.
Police had other information that supported searching the property, he said. Cox declined to disclose what it was.
And so search crews arrived on Tuesday, combing the 187-acre Scotts Mills property for the next two days. West Valley City Police on Thursday declared the search was over.
They found a bone -- believed to probably be a deer bone, Cox said -- and some cans that may have marked a location.
But to his disappointment, the dogs signaled no "hard alerts," Cox said.
Cox said he expects the West Valley City Police will be reducing their efforts on the investigation until new leads turn up. But Cox remains hopeful.
He expects the police may share additional information from the investigation, which may spark new leads from the public, he said.
"We hope that all the new eyes, minds and resources wll eventually lead to the recovery of our daughter, Susan," he said. "We believe our daughter will be found."
Although disappointed, he said he and his wife focus on the Susan Cox Powell Foundation, which they created in memory of their daughter and two grandsons.
And he comforts himself with an "eternal perspective."
"I know if she is dead, she is in a much better place. The boys are with their mother," he said. And as for Josh and Michael Powell, they may have escaped any prosecution in this life, he said. But "I believe in our Heavenly father and I know they didn't get away with anything."
-- Helen Jung