Body Identified as Suspected Killer : Violence: A man found dead in the desert was being sought in the slayings of his family. Some news reports have speculated that he may have been a spy.

A body found in the Anza-Borrego Desert State Park was identified Monday as that of British businessman Ian Stuart Spiro, suspected by sheriff’s investigators of killing his wife and three children.

The 46-year-old Rancho Santa Fe resident was found slumped over the steering wheel of his white 1992 Ford Explorer by campers in the popular hiking area Sunday at 3:57 p.m.

Sheriff’s investigators have identified Spiro as a commodities broker, but news reports in the United States and England have speculated that the British native was a spy and that he may have been linked to the Lebanese hostage crisis.

Spiro’s wife and three children were found dead in their rented Rancho Santa Fe home Thursday. Gail Spiro, 40, daughters Sara, 16, and Dina, 11, and son Adam, 14, were found dead in separate bedrooms of their Rancho Santa Fe house, each shot in the head.

Members of the family, who had moved to the upscale enclave a few months ago, were last seen by neighbors on Nov. 1, and investigators said they believe that the family had been dead for several days before they were discovered.

On Monday, investigators said they believe Ian Spiro had been dead for two or three days before his body was discovered, placing his death several days after the death of his family.

San Diego County Sheriff’s Lt. John Tenwolde said Spiro had suffered no outward signs of trauma, and deputy medical examiners said an autopsy was conducted Monday to determine the cause of death.

“Anything is possible, but the evidence at the current time is that Ian Spiro killed his family,” Tenwolde said. “Had we not discovered the body, we would be at the district attorney’s office today seeking a warrant for his arrest.”

Tenwolde said they are waiting for toxicology tests to be conducted on Spiro’s body, the results of which could take several weeks.

“We have labeled it a death investigation,” Tenwolde said. “We have not labeled it a suicide; we have not labeled it a murder.”

No motive has been determined in any of the deaths, Tenwolde said, but detectives will look into rumors that the family had financial difficulties.

No weapons linked to the deaths have been located, Tenwolde said, and no suicide note has been found.

Investigators are in the midst of a detailed study of the Rancho Santa Fe house, Tenwolde said, including the taking of “hundreds of fingerprints” and electrostatic lifts of footprint impressions from the floors of the house.

Tenwolde said slugs have been recovered from bedrooms in the house, but declined to say what kind they were, how many were found or if bullet casings were found as well.

An inspection of the vehicle in which Spiro was found has yet to be conducted, Tenwolde said, and it was unclear whether Spiro had died at the scene or if he had been killed earlier and driven to the remote area near the Imperial County line.

Tenwolde said Spiro was “familiar with the desert area” and that he had visited the region “on occasion for recreational purposes.”

The accounts linking Spiro to espionage activity have not been confirmed, although Tenwolde said the Sheriff’s Department has “had liaison interaction with a number of agencies” in the course of the investigation. Tenwolde declined, however, to name or describe those agencies.