Anish Vij
A new development in the chilling 52-year-old cold case of a missing university student bears an eerie similarity to the claims of a psychic decades earlier.
Douglas Brick, a 23-year-old University of Utah student, disappeared from his dorm on 12 October 1973.
Police and rescue workers remained stumped for five decades until a breakthrough last year when two skull fragments were found at the top of Black Mountain.
University of Utah Police said that hunters came across fragments of a human skull last October, almost to the day Brick went missing.
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Major Heather Sturzenegger, who worked on the case at the time, decided to reopen it after a DNA test provided a 99.9 percent genetic match with a living relative.
“We never stopped hoping for answers about Doug’s disappearance,” Brick’s family said in a statement.
“Many years ago, we pushed for the cold case to be reopened with the addition of DNA evidence.
“We are relieved to finally have some answers.
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“After 52 years, this result, while sad, is nothing short of a miracle.”
Sturzenegger and Detective John Dial began working on the case in 2022 and came across a journal belonging to Brick’s mother, Donna, who died in 2010.
Donna wrote that while shopping at a department store in Salt Lake City, she encountered a shop worker who claimed she was a psychic.
“Maybe you can tell me what happened to my son,” the grieving mum asked her.
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“He really wants you to find him,” the psychic responded, noting that Brick had gone to the foothills above campus, where he contemplated ending his life.
But after changing his mind, it got dark and slipped and fell, the psychic said.
“These details stuck out to me,” Dial explained.
“Where the skull was located, the terrain I was traversing as part of the search, it is extremely steep and loose on both sides, and I was having a hard time in the daylight keeping my footing under me and figuring out where I was going.”
“In a way, it’s hard to explain. There was a push and a connection that I felt was from Douglas,” he added.
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“I have felt very strongly that I will always have Douglas in the back of my mind.”
“For me, I just wanted to try to bring closure to the family and solve the case so they can have some peace,” Sturzenegger said.
Police still don't know exactly how Brick died.