#2502 - David Paulides

David Paulides, a former law enforcement officer, began investigating disappearances in U.S. national parks after rangers at Yosemite approached him privately. They described cases where people vanished in clusters, initial searches drew public attention for roughly ten to fourteen days, then activity stopped. The Park Service resisted releasing reports through Freedom of Information Act requests, and the rangers suspected inadequate follow-up rather than deliberate concealment at first.

Patterns in the Cases

Paulides collected data on hundreds of incidents that share recurring features. Search dogs often fail to pick up a scent or abruptly stop tracking, even when multiple teams are used. Professional trackers report no visible trails despite clear conditions. Disappearances frequently occur at the moment a person separates from a group, whether on a hunt or a hike. Clothing is sometimes found neatly piled in mild weather, and bodies that are eventually recovered appear in locations that contradict normal movement, such as distant boulder fields or near water without corresponding tracks. Paulides notes that items like shoes, belt buckles, and firearms tend to remain when organic remains are absent, yet these durable objects are also missing in many unresolved cases.