Man found dead after possible road rage incident in Jordanelle

HIDEOUT, Wasatch County – A 61-year-old man found dead at the north entrance to Jordanelle State Park on Thursday has sparked a criminal investigation.

The Wasatch County Sheriff's Office and the Utah Division of State Parks responded to a call about a possible suicide near the Ross Creek Day Use Area around 11 a.m. However, investigators concluded that the man's death was criminal, but did not provide any information about the man's cause of death.

Sheriff Jared Rigby said they believe there was a road rage incident Wednesday night before the Wasatch County man was found dead.

“This individual drove their vehicle here and arrived around 11pm last night, there was a second vehicle that was here and as far as the possible disturbance on the road may have occurred, we are still investigating that,” Rigby said said.

The sheriff's office told KSL TV that only the victim's car was found near the gatehouse at the entrance to the state park, which was unoccupied overnight. The man's body was found outside the car.

“It wasn’t on SR 248,” Rigby said. “It was on Shoreline Drive.”

Investigators said they have video that they are combing through to figure out exactly what led to this. The video was from the area where the incident occurred.

“There's a video that we're still going through to see how big of a factoid we have with it,” Rigby said.

He said the victim drove down the street and the suspect's vehicle followed him.

Investigators believe the second car could be a Jeep Gladiator or a Jeep Rubicon with “possible front end damage,” according to a news release.

“We are calling on the people in the second vehicle to come forward. The sooner you come forward to deal with the situation, the better,” the office’s press release said.

Police are contacting the man's next of kin before releasing his identity, but confirmed he lived in Wasatch County. The Sheriff's Office does not believe this death is related to any other suspicious deaths in Tooele County.

Rigby said he was concerned that the traffic commotion led to this suspicious death.

“I know that all law enforcement agencies in the state are working hard to ensure strict enforcement so that this kind of thing doesn’t happen,” he said. “And we really appreciate those who call and help us when they see or observe something. It's incidents like this that happen quite often. And we are very worried about them and want to help them.”