Body Found in Sierra Foothills Identified as Daughter of Tourist

A body found in the scenic Sierra foothills was identified Friday as Juliana Sund, 15, who vanished on a Yosemite vacation, and investigators said a second body found 30 miles away in a charred rental car was likely 16-year-old Silvina Pelosso, a friend from Argentina.

Authorities identified the victims one day after Juliana’s body was discovered on a vista point overlooking Don Pedro Reservoir outside Sonora.

The girls vanished more than a month ago, along with Juliana’s mother, Carole Sund, whose charred body was also found in the burned-out rental car’s trunk. She was identified Monday.

“We thought we were prepared and, of course, we weren’t,” Francis Carrington, grandfather of Juliana and father of Carole, said Friday night.

A task force of two dozen FBI agents and local investigators is continuing a massive manhunt to identify the killer.

Tuolumne County Sheriff Richard L. Rogers said DNA testing was used to tentatively identify Silvina, who had been staying with the Sunds at their Eureka home. The probe, he said, is moving “at a very intensified rate.”

Investigators confirmed Juliana’s identification through dental records. Authorities released no details about the cause of death or how they found her body.

“We will bring all available resources to bear in order to solve this horrible crime,” said FBI Special Agent James M. Maddock of Sacramento, vowing to bring to justice “those responsible” for the triple slayings.

On Friday, a team of investigators picked through the site where Juliana’s body was found the previous day beside the reservoir in the Central California foothills, a rural and rolling region best known for its Gold Rush-era towns and quaint bed and breakfast inns.

The body was discovered in a thicket of dense brush and scrub oak overlooking the reservoir, a Tuolumne County lake frequented on weekends by boaters and anglers.

The lake is at the junction of the road to Yosemite National Park, near where the three tourists were last seen, and a highway that winds past the Sierra forest where the trio’s torched rental car was found a week ago with two charred bodies in the trunk.

The mysterious disappearance and the manhunt that has followed have grabbed national attention. Family members have maintained a vigil at a Modesto hotel the past month and have given scores of interviews, hoping to generate tips to crack the case.

Silvina’s family owns a small bottling company in Cordoba, Argentina. A shy teenager who excelled at sports and scholastically, she jumped at an offer from the Sund family to visit California during a three-month break from her studies in Argentina.

Silvina was attending Eureka High School with Juliana, and the two grew close. Family members describe Juliana as a bubbly teenager with a wide range of interests, from cheerleading to the violin and piano.

Carole Sund, 42, the mother of four, ran a small real estate business. She also was an inveterate volunteer at numerous children’s charities and at the Eureka schools her children attend.

Sund’s parents and several other family members also live in the Eureka area, where they run the Carrington Co. real estate investment firm, which made millions in the Santa Rosa area before moving operations north about two decades ago.

Sund and the girls were last seen the evening of Feb. 15, eating hamburgers at the Cedar Lodge restaurant in El Portal, a tiny community at the front entrance to Yosemite.

“The crime could have occurred anywhere from the Cedar Lodge outward,” Maddock said Friday, adding that the investigation is expected to be lengthy.

The three tourists vanished as they were set to return from their holiday weekend outing. For several days, search parties scoured major highways in the Sierra, concerned that their red Pontiac Grand Prix might have plunged off one of the winding roads.

But within a week, investigators began to suspect foul play after a portion of Sund’s wallet was found on a busy street in Modesto, about a two-hour drive from Yosemite.

The discovery of the rental car a week ago generated fresh reports of possible last sightings. Authorities have been busy sifting through the accounts to determine their credibility, but have emphasized that many of the reports conflict.

Investigators also have continued to question and eliminate potential suspects, focusing on residents of the central Sierra and San Joaquin Valley who have criminal pasts. Maddock said he expected a federal grand jury to be impaneled, probably next week, in Fresno to assist in the investigation.

On Friday night, Silvina’s family was making plans to return her body to Argentina for burial.

“This is the news we both wanted, yet dread, to hear,” said Raquel Pelosso, her mother. “We were not ready when we heard it.”

The Sund familywas preparing for memorial services next week in Eureka.

“She was just a really sweet girl,” said Juliana’s grandmother, Carole Carrington. “I’m just going to miss her so much.”