Maynard Koen’s body has still not been identified, but a discovery by two divers last week may bring some closure to the Prosser man’s 1993 disappearance.

While diving in the marina of Hat Rock State Park last Thursday, Courtney and John Talbot made a startling discovery — a red pickup truck, submerged 20 feet under water, just past the dock of the popular Umatilla County recreation spot.

The truck, police determined, belonged to Koen, a Prosser, Washington resident who was reported missing in 1993.

Umatilla County Undersheriff Jim Littlefield said they found Koen’s wallet and identification inside the truck, as well as skeletal remains. He said the remains were turned over to the medical examiner’s office, but he didn’t know how long it would be before they would be identified.

“We were out there by accident,” Courtney Talbot said. “I work in a bar, and one of the guys in there was missing a boat propeller.”

Talbot and her husband, who are newly certified and avid divers, decided to go help the man look for the propeller, which he had lost just past the marina.

The marina water is murky, Talbot said, and ordinarily wouldn’t be a place they’d dive. The boat propeller never turned up, but something else did. The Talbots found a truck — corroded red paint, bed weighed down with debris and dirt — but in relatively good condition.

At first, Talbot said, they didn’t think much of it — as divers, it’s not uncommon to find odd things in the water. A couple of weeks ago, they found some guns while diving, which they reported to the police.

While they were diving, they pulled the adhesive tags off the truck, memorized the license plate and reported it to police.

Talbot said the Umatilla County Sheriff’s Office told her the truck was connected to a missing persons case, but didn’t share much more information at the time.

Curious to learn more, she got Koen’s missing persons report and started trying to learn more about him.

“There wasn’t a whole lot about him in there,” she said. “I couldn’t find any family.”

Looking through social media and news reports, Talbot found that many people remembered Koen from when he lived in Prosser, but no one seemed to be able to say where his family was, or if he had any.

She found, based on an Ancestry.com report, that Koen had immigrated from Albania.

But she still hopes someone from his family will come forward.

“I feel invested,” she said. “Pretty much from the get-go, we’ve been having this conversation of, ‘Holy crap, what else do you say about finding this truck that had a dead body in it?’” Talbot said. “I want to at least find the family.”

Still, she said, she and her husband are in disbelief about the find — especially as relatively new divers.

“This is the kind of thing you tell your grandchildren about,” she said. “Helping solve a 26-year-old missing persons case.”

—Jayati Ramakrishnan; 503-221-4320; jramakrishnan@oregonian.com; @JRamakrishnanOR

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