UNANSWERED QUESTIONS

Holly Courtier’s Story of Vanishing in Zion National Park Doesn’t ‘Add Up,’ Cop Says

There was no obvious sign of a head injury, and the river where she would have gotten water was toxic, a police official says.

The discovery of a California woman inside Utah’s Zion National Park 12 days after she went missing is sparking more questions than answers, with a police official noting discrepancies between the family’s story and rescuers’ account. Washington County Sheriff’s Sgt. Darrell Cashin told ABC4 that the details about Holly Courtier’s disappearance and re-emergence “don’t add up.” For one thing, her family said the 38-year-old mom was disoriented from a head injury—but park rescuers didn’t report any obvious issues. Cashin also said that Courtier’s family suggested she survived on water from a river—which happened to be afflicted by a toxic algal bloom. “If she had been drinking that water, unless she had some really high immune system, she would’ve been very, very ill and probably unable to come out on her own,” he said.