Body of Missing Boy Recovered From Bottom of Ravine

The body of a missing 15-year-old Pomona boy was recovered from the bottom of a rugged ravine in the Cleveland National Forest on Monday, more than 24 hours after he left his family campsite to go on a solo hike, authorities said.

The body of Jeremy (Jake) Michael Beecher was spotted Monday morning, but it took rescuers until Monday evening to retrieve it.

The body was lifted out by a Marine Corps helicopter and taken to a nearby campground, where family members identified it, according to Sue Olson, spokeswoman for the Cleveland National Forest Trabuco Ranger Station. The body was then taken to Orange County, where an autopsy will be performed to determine the cause of death.

A preliminary report indicated that Jeremy suffered massive head injuries, probably caused by a fall, according to Orange County Sheriff’s Lt. Jay Mendez.

More than 50 people from search-and-rescue teams began looking for the boy Sunday evening when he failed to return to the campsite after hiking alone.

The teen-ager, his father and 24 family friends had been on a weekend visit to Falcon campgrounds that began Friday night, Olson said.

According to sheriff’s deputies, the teen-ager’s father, David Beecher, said his son had gone hiking at about 10:30 a.m. Sunday. When he hadn’t returned to the campsite by 5:30 p.m., the family reported him missing.

The teen-ager was last seen wearing jeans, a T-shirt, a Pendleton shirt and boots. Although he was not carrying any camping equipment, he was versed in outdoor survival skills that he learned in the Boy Scouts, Olson said.

His body was spotted by an Orange County Sheriff’s Department helicopter crew about 10:40 a.m. Monday near San Juan Creek, about two miles from the campground. The body was at the bottom of a ravine in Hot Springs Canyon, an area so rugged that it took search-and-rescue teams more than seven hours to reach it.

Three 100-foot-tall canyon walls surround the area where the body was spotted, authorities said.

As rescuers made their way to the body, the boy’s father and family friends waited at the campsite.

Friends described Jeremy as a “regular kid” who loved nature and hiking. They said he also composed and played music.

Saturday night, the group had stayed up by the campfire sharing stories, the friends said.

The teen-ager’s mother, who is divorced from his father, heard about her missing son through a radio news report Monday afternoon, sheriff’s deputies said.

“She was very distressed,” Mendez said.

The site where the weekend camp-out was being held is about 15 miles northeast of San Juan Capistrano in Orange County at an elevation of about 3,500 feet.

Temperatures dropped below 40 degrees overnight as rescuers used two bloodhounds in their search.

Assisting sheriff’s deputies Monday were the Riverside County mountain rescue team, staff members from the Cleveland National Forest, the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service and the Orange County search-and-rescue team.

On Monday afternoon, authorities called in the El Toro search-and-rescue team to help recover the body.