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May 22, 2008 6:21 pm US/Central
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Police Say Missing Prof Suggested Suicide
CANYONLANDS NATIONAL PARK, Utah (AP) ―
A Minnesota professor missing in a Utah national park spoke of suicide in a letter to relatives and told them to "just leave me where I am."
The police chief in Sartell, Minn., disclosed the contents of a letter signed by Jerry O. Wolff.
Wolff, 65, a biology professor at St. Cloud State University, hasn't been seen for more than a week. He was supposed to end a hike May 16 in the extremely rugged Needles district in Canyonlands National Park.
"It's clearly one of those areas where if you don't want to be found, you won't be found. This is the world's best hiding place," Chief Ranger Denny Ziemann told The Associated Press.
He wants to use search dogs but called it off Thursday because of weather.
In Minneapolis, the Star Tribune says Sartell Police Chief Jim Hughes quoted from a Wolff letter.
"I am so sorry to burden you with yet another death," the letter said. "I am gone in a remote wilderness where I can return my body and soul to nature. There is no reason for anyone to look for me, just leave me where I am."
Wolff's companion, Shawn Thomas, 38, described him as "an extremely stressed person" but said there was "nothing in his life that I was aware of that he should not have worked through."
They lived together along with her two daughters.
Wolff is an experienced outdoorsman, from hunting in Alaska to kayaking around Isle Royale in Lake Superior to backpacking in national parks in the West, Thomas told the Star Tribune.
(© 2008 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)