Body of Nurse Apparently Found : Search: Volunteers discover remains believed to be those of Kellie O’Sullivan. She vanished the night that a man used her truck to kidnap his girlfriend.

The badly decomposed body of a woman believed to be missing Westlake Village nurse Kellie O’Sullivan was found Sunday in a brush-choked area of the Santa Monica Mountains, Los Angeles County sheriff’s investigators reported.

The early morning discovery by two volunteers came after hundreds of friends and law enforcement agents had searched for almost two weeks for the 34-year-old missing nurse, the mother of a 5-year-old boy. She was last seen Sept. 14 outside a store in Thousand Oaks after leaving her job at a medical clinic in Canoga Park.

Although official identification must await the comparison of dental records, family members said they were told that the body is O’Sullivan’s.

“Police told us it was her,” said Cliff O’Sullivan, the nurse’s ex-husband.

The body, clad in a nurse’s uniform, was found in a remote area of Los Angeles County off Mulholland Highway. The two who found her were part of a team of 200 volunteers who had been searching since shortly after O’Sullivan vanished.

O’Sullivan disappeared on the same day that Stephanie Campbell, 16, of Thousand Oaks was allegedly abducted at gunpoint by her boyfriend.

Campbell turned up in Reno last week after her alleged abductor, Mark Scott Thornton, 19, was arrested at a Reno casino. Police said they found O’Sullivan’s Ford Explorer parked outside the casino, and Thornton admitted stealing it.

Thornton of Thousand Oaks allegedly told police that he took the truck after finding it empty with the keys inside in front of a Thousand Oaks pet store. He denied knowing anything about O’Sullivan.

Thornton was transferred Sunday from the Washoe County Jail in Reno to the custody of the Ventura County Sheriff’s Department for return to Ventura, said a booking clerk with the Washoe jail.

Law enforcement officials said Sunday that it is too early to discuss possible charges in O’Sullivan’s disappearance.

Thornton, who faces arraignment on charges of kidnaping Campbell, may also face charges of assault or attempted murder for shooting at Campbell’s mother before he drove away, officials said.

Shortly after O’Sullivan’s disappearance, her boyfriend, Kevin White, organized a search with local authorities out of his Thousand Oaks home. Searchers gathered there Sunday, this time talking in quiet resignation about the woman they now presume is dead.

“I think Kellie’s life, and her death, probably has impacted more hearts and souls than most people who pass this way,” said her mother, Sharlene Cunningham. “She always put others before herself.”

When Cunningham was recently found to have breast cancer, her daughter arranged for surgery and paid the bills, Cunningham said.

She said she feared that her daughter was dead long before the body was discovered. “I could feel in my heart she wasn’t here,” Cunningham said.

“I’m actually quite relieved,” said O’Sullivan’s ex-husband, Cliff O’Sullivan, who is now caring for the couple’s 5-year-old son. “At least we can put a period at the end of the sentence.”

Cliff O’Sullivan described his ex-wife as “an avid athlete with a lot of stick-to-itiveness. She did one thing perfect and that was be a mom.”

White said he and Sullivan had been making plans. “We were talking about getting married,” White said. “We were making plans for having a baby.”

Los Angeles County sheriff’s homicide Detective Lt. Frank Merriman said detectives would have to determine whether O’Sullivan died in Los Angeles County or in Ventura County before deciding which jurisdiction should prosecute the case.

Correspondents Jeff McDonald and Julie Fields contributed to this story.