Body found believed to be missing California teen
SAN DIEGO, CA
The remains were found buried in a park about 10 feet from the
shoreline of a tributary to Lake Hodges, San Diego County Sheriff
William Gore said.
"While the body has not been positively identified, there is a
strong likelihood that we have found Chelsea," he told reporters.
Gore said he had informed the teen's parents.
"Obviously they are devastated and I ask that you respect their
privacy during this extremely difficult time," he said.
The body was spotted at 1 p.m. by search divers working their
way up the tributary just south of the lake. Gore said it was in an
area that had been searched extensively since King vanished on
Thursday and was not far from where a piece of evidence -- a shoe --
had been discovered previously.
"We will be doing a thorough crime scene investigation that
will take quite some time," he said.
Police, meanwhile, said the registered sex offender suspected in
King's disappearance likely assaulted a jogger in December in the
same park.
The 22-year-old Colorado woman managed to fend off her attacker
on Dec. 27 in Rancho Bernardo Community Park on the northern edge
of San Diego, where King's 1994 BMW was found with her belongings
inside, police Capt. Jim Collins said.
Police said evidence has linked 30-year-old John Albert Gardner
III to both cases but further details have not been released.
Collins, however, said a swab taken from the elbow of the
Colorado woman did not match Gardner's DNA.
Gardner is now in custody without bail for investigation of
murder and rape in the King case.
Gardner of Lake Elsinore pleaded guilty in May 2000 to molesting
a 13-year-old female neighbor. Prosecutors said he lured the victim
to his home with an offer to watch "Patch Adams," a 1998 movie
starring Robin Williams.
The girl was beaten before escaping and running to a neighbor.
Gardner served five years in prison after prosecutors rejected a
psychiatrist's advice to seek stiffer punishment, court documents
state.
Prosecutors said in 2000 that Gardner's lack of a significant
prior criminal record justified less than the maximum sentence.
They also said they wanted to "spare the victim the trauma of
testifying."
Gardner had faced a maximum of nearly 11 years in prison under
terms of his plea agreement. Prosecutors urged six years -- the
sentence later ordered by a judge.
In their 11-page sentencing memo, prosecutors said Gardner
"never expressed one scintilla of remorse for his attack upon the
victim" despite overwhelming evidence.
Psychiatrist Dr. Matthew Carroll wrote in sentencing documents,
"There is no known treatment for an individual that sexually
assaults girls and does not admit to it in any way."
Paul Pfingst, the San Diego County district attorney in 2000,
said he had no memory of the case but added a six-year sentence was
not unusual for someone with no significant prior criminal record.
The district attorney's office declined to comment or make
available David Hendren, the prosecutor who handled the case.
State records showed Gardner was released from prison on Sept.
26, 2005 and was on parole for three years.
Chelsea King was described as a straight-A student at Poway High
School, playing French horn for the San Diego Youth Symphony,
competing on her school cross-country team and volunteering in a
peer counseling program.
In an interview Monday with The Associated Press, the Kings, who
also have a 13-year-old son, recounted learning their daughter had
disappeared.
Brent King had returned from the gym around 5:30 p.m., the same
time his wife, Kelly, 48, got home with groceries. Chelsea, who
always kept them advised of her whereabouts, wasn't home.
"Because it was so out of character for Chelsea not to tell us
or call us and say I'm going to be late ... we just had that
feeling," Brent King said.