KAMAS, Utah — Shaunee Cunningham’s great-grandmother was like a best friend to her.
“Me and my [great] grandmother were really close," she said. "I spent a lot of time at her house when I was a kid, every holiday. All of her 99 birthdays, I was there for all of them."
The West Valley City Police Department continues to call on the public to help them search for the body of 99-year-old Maren Carlson.
Officials believe she was kidnapped and murdered by her grandson, Garman Shaun Cunningham, in November of 2021, and he disposed of her body up in the high Uintas.
Last December, Cunningham, who is Shaunee’s father, was charged with kidnapping and murdering Carlson. In March, he died by suicide in prison.
“I never thought he was capable of committing murder," said Cunningham. "He was an aggressive person. The domestic violence I could believe, but the murdering of his own grandmother was something that, it took me a while to wrap my head around, especially since he loved her a lot, so that was really hard for me to understand.”
West Valley City Police, as well as Summit and Wasatch County Sheriff’s officers, have been searching the Uintas for months, looking for Carlson’s body and pink fabric from pajamas they believe she was wearing. With fall approaching, officials are asking the community for help, said Roxeanne Vainuku, Deputy Director of Communications for the West Valley City Police Department.
“In the next few weeks, the hunting season will start," she said. "It'll start with the archery season. It will become fall, and there will be leaves in the mountains that people want to see, and so we know that these next couple of months are going to be a time when people are in Utah's mountains.”
Cunningham wants people to know how much it would mean if any sign of Carlson was found.
“In the last eight months, I have buried all of my family," she said. "My father, his mother, and now I just want something to bury her and put her to rest. She is the last of that side of my family, complete last. So even if it's just something to bury, it would mean a lot just to put closure because that is the only thing that's holding me up.”
She’s hopeful that someone somewhere will help her bring her great-grandmother home.
“I did for a little while lose hope, but it's coming back," said Cunningham. "So I feel eventually something will come up.”
The West Valley City Police Department asks if you find anything in the mountains you think could be a piece of evidence, do not touch it. Instead, mark your location by dropping a pin on your phone or writing down your coordinates and give that to authorities.
