Hooray for the backcountry horsemen and women – Mary Young, Mike Young, Mark John, and Christa John – the four Idahoans who tipped off police to the whereabouts of kidnapper Joseph DiMaggio and his victim, Hannah Anderson.
According to a report in the Boise newspaper, the four riders came across the two Californians in the Frank Church River of No Return Wilderness. They were concerned for the girl and thought something wasn’t right, but were camping and did not know about the massive, multi-state manhunt for DiMaggio and the Amber Alert for Hannah.
It was only when they returned home that night to Sweet, Idaho, that they connected their encounters with the breaking news.
Mark John is a retired county sheriff and called a colleague at the Idaho State Police with their urgent information.
Andrea Dearden, spokeswoman for the Ada County Sheriff’s Office, praised the foursome.
The information from the horseback riders was crucial to Hannah’s rescue, Dearden continued, saying it was “absolutely” the needle in the haystack investigators were hoping to find.
“Their information, that’s what led people here,” she said. “We had no way to know where to look until we were able to speak to them.”
“They played the biggest role in this operation,” Dearden said.
Read more from the Los Angeles Times article