Published: October 31, 2009 02:58 pm      

Search for missing family scaled back

After nearly two weeks of combing the heavily wooded Sans Bois Mountain area in southeast Oklahoma, the Latimer County Sheriff’s Office on Friday called off its ground search for a missing Eufaula family.

Investigators still are pursuing leads in the disappearance of Bobby Dale Jamison, 44, his wife Sherrilyn, 40, and the couple’s 6-year-old daughter, Madyson, but Sheriff Israel Beauchamp said no clues turned up in the search of the area so it’s being halted.

“If we get anything that leads us back out there, we’ll be back out there searching,” Beauchamp said. “But we’ve exhausted our resources and the few clues we did have.”

The Jamisons were last seen by a landowner in the Red Oak area on Oct. 8. A search was launched Oct. 17 after hunters came across the family’s pickup truck at a remote well pad site near a 40-acre plot they were considering buying, Beauchamp said.

Investigators found a wallet, purse, cell phones, a large amount of cash and Madyson’s small dog inside the truck. It appeared to authorities that the family had planned to return to the vehicle, and there were no signs of foul play.

Beauchamp said an extensive air and ground search involving more than 300 volunteers and dozens of law enforcement officers uncovered no signs of the family.

“It seems like they just stepped outside of their vehicle and disappeared,” he said.

While Beauchamp said his office and other agencies still are actively working the case, he acknowledged it is unlikely the family could have survived this long in the rugged terrain.

He said heavy rains hit the area during the time the family went missing, but that even rain-swollen creeks on the mountain would not be strong enough to sweep away the adults.

Beauchamp said both Bobby and Sherrilyn Jamison are disabled and do not work. He said Bobby Jamison was injured in a car accident, but he declined to elaborate on Sherrilyn Jamison’s disability.

The family often traveled to time-share units around the country, he said. They were originally from the Oklahoma City area, but had recently moved to Eufaula.

Family members of the Jamisons did not immediately return phone calls to The Associated Press for comment Friday.

Bobby Dale Jamison filed a civil lawsuit in Oklahoma County against his father, Bobby Dean Jamison, earlier this year in a dispute over ownership of a gas station in Oklahoma City. In the lawsuit, which is still pending, Bobby Dale Jamison alleges his father threatened his family.

The father denied those claims in a legal filing. Neither he nor his attorney immediately returned phone calls to the AP for comment Friday.

Beauchamp said he’s interviewed the father and doesn’t believe the court dispute has anything to do with the family’s disappearance.

“Nothing is leading us in that direction,” the sheriff said. “But at this time, we’re leaving everything open.”