PORT ANGELES — Cecil Olmstead, a 68-year-old Port Angeles man reported missing Monday, was found dead of apparent natural causes across the street from his South Doss Road home on Wednesday afternoon.
“It just appeared he was out cutting brush and may have had a heart attack and died of natural causes,” said Clallam County Detective Sgt. Lyman Moores on Wednesday.
Wayne Olmstead of Huntington Beach, Calif., said Wednesday that the family appreciated the search effort and the news coverage his father’s disappearance received.
“Unfortunately, it wasn’t what we were hoping for,” he said.
“We thank everybody who helped and allowed us to put up fliers, and everything that helped us find him.”
Cecil Olmstead was reported missing by his ex-wife, Karen Schoenfeldt, after food for the ducks on his property that had been left on his porch Friday was still there on Monday afternoon.
A Clallam County sheriff’s detective and two deputies searched the 11-acre property on Tuesday and found nothing.
At about 3 p.m. Wednesday, Clallam County Search and Rescue members were called to the property to assist in searching the wooded area around the Port Angeles man’s property.
A neighbor told sheriff’s detectives he had seen Olmstead cutting brush across Doss Road from his house.
When searchers looked there, they found Olmstead’s body.
“There’s nothing suspicious,” Moores said.
Information on services is pending, Wayne Olmstead said.
