Missing hiker Rock Stanley was found dead on Saturday near Mount Charleston Peak Trail, according to the Clark County coroner’s office.
The 75-year-old, who the coroner’s office said was from Athens, Texas, was officially pronounced dead just after 5 p.m. Saturday. His cause and manner of death were still pending Monday morning, but the Metropolitan Police Department said there was no evidence of foul play.
Stanley was last seen around 5 a.m. on Aug. 23 near the 2700 block of Kyle Canyon Road, according to Metro.
The family partnered with a drone pilot, a K9 search and rescue team, Red Rock Search and Rescue and a visual tracking expert during a nearly month-long search.
Red Rock Search and Rescue Commander Craig McVeay said Stanley was found around 12:30 p.m. Saturday 1,200 feet southeast of Lee Peak, just off of the Charleston Loop Trail. He said information provided by the Stanley family and Metro led searchers to the man’s location.
“Utilizing this information, we were able to see that Mr. Stanley had progressed much farther along the trail than initial eyewitness reports indicated,” McVeay said in a statement to the Review-Journal on Monday.
Stanley was visiting Mount Charleston with his wife, Karen Stanley, after traveling from Texas.
Rock Stanley had made the trip to hike Mount Charleston about 30 times and, as he had done a handful of times, he did the hike alone. He left his wife at the lodge when he left in the morning and planned to come back later that day, according to a Facebook post from his son, Brian Stanley.
His planned hike was up the North Loop Trail to the summit and returning down via the South Loop Trail, McVeay said.
Rock Stanley was a lieutenant colonel in the Marine Corps who served for 36 years. He taught high school for 34 years in Texas and coached multiple sports, according to his granddaughter Courtney Stanley.
“He’s touched a lot of people’s lives in a good way. We’ve always said this: He is one of the kindest people you’ll ever meet,” Courtney Stanley said. “He is definitely the kind of person who would give you the shirt off his back.”
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