Five Found Dead on Rural Oregon Property, Suspect Dead in Washington State

Deputies in Washington County, Oregon were called out at 5:27 a.m. Saturday to help the Forest Grove Fire Department deal with a reported vehicle fire. What they found instead was a crime scene.

Firefighters arrived at 47350 NW Otis Lane, a rural property outside Forest Grove about 25 to 30 miles west of downtown Portland, and discovered human remains, according to the Washington County Sheriff's Office. This led to a law enforcement response that discovered five dead people and several dead domestic animals on the property, officials said at a Sunday news conference.

Detective Shannon Wilde told reporters the case is being investigated as a quintuple homicide. "We're investigating this as five people that were murdered," Wilde said, according to bankspost. Investigators do not believe it was a random act.

By Sunday evening, the Sheriff's Office said it had identified a suspect: 36-year-old Benjamin Parker, who was found dead in Enumclaw, Washington, according to KPTV. Authorities said they believe Parker died by suicide. No one else is in custody, and officials said they do not believe there is any ongoing danger to the community.

A scene the sheriff calls unlike anything in 22 years

Washington County Sheriff Caprice Massey did not mince words about the scale of the investigation. "In my 22 years here, I have not been a part of or witnessed a scene quite this complex involving this type of an investigation," Massey said, a line repeated across AP News, ABC News, Oregon Public Broadcasting, KPTV, bankspost and Yahoo News.

Massey called the deaths "deeply concerning to our community" and said her office has "dedicated every available resource to this case."

More than a dozen agencies have been pulled into the response, according to bankspost, including the Washington County Major Crimes Team, an interagency detective unit drawn from law enforcement across the county, plus Oregon State Police forensics teams, K-9 units and Washington County Animal Services. Yahoo News reported the FBI is not involved.

The property sits in a heavily vegetated, hilly rural area, and Dave Nemeyer of Forest Grove Fire & Rescue said crews were pulled back once the scene turned dangerous. "We responded to a report of a house on fire this morning, called in by neighbors who could see fire through the trees," Nemeyer said, according to bankspost. "I had our crews remove themselves and the fire engine from the scene at that time, and it's been the responsibility of the sheriff's office since."

What investigators still won't say

More than 24 hours passed between the initial discovery and the Sunday briefing, and reporters pressed Wilde on the delay. She said the office was working to identify the victims and notify next of kin before going public, while also managing what she called a "very active investigation with a lot of moving pieces," per ABC News.

As of Sunday, investigators had not released the identities, ages, or genders of the five victims. Wilde would not say whether the victims lived at the property, where on the property they were found, whether they were found together or separately, or how they died. She also declined to specify what kind of animals were killed or how many, according to Yahoo News.

Oregon Public Broadcasting reported that a detective's business card was left at the Portland address listed for the property's owner, and that neighbors there confirmed police had been in the area. When OPB asked about the property owner directly at the press conference, Wilde declined to answer.

The open questions

The biggest unresolved piece of this story is motive and connection. Investigators say they still don't know who the five victims were or how Benjamin Parker, the suspect found dead roughly 170 miles north in Enumclaw, Washington, connects to the property or the people on it.

The Sheriff's Office is asking anyone who knew the residents of the Otis Lane property, or their associates, to call its non-emergency line at 503-629-0111 and reference case number 50-26-11866. "There are no details too small," Massey said.

Until the victims are formally identified and next of kin notified, Washington County officials say they won't release further specifics. That leaves a rural community west of Portland with a five-person homicide, a dead suspect, and very few public answers about how it happened.