A 17-year-old boy charged with the murder of a paddleboarder who went missing from a Maine campground eagerly volunteered to help authorities during the two-week search for the killer — leading them on “a wild goose chase” until they arrested him, the site owner said.
Sunshine “Sunny” Stewart, 48, went missing on July 2 while paddleboarding alone at the Mic Mac Cove Campground’s 600-acre pond. Her body was found early the following day under “unusual circumstances” — she had been bludgeoned and strangled to death, a medical examiner determined.
A two-week manhunt ensued as authorities scoured the area for the killer who rocked the usually sleepy and tight-knit summer hotspot.
Among the people pitching in was Deven Young, a teenager vacationing with his parents for the second season in a row.
“He volunteered, he said he had some information, and he took them in the opposite direction of where Sunny was found. He had said he had something to show them, and took them out on the lake on pretty much a wild goose chase,” campground owner Katherine Lunt told ABC News.
Investigators didn’t have to look far after all — the alleged killer was in front of them the whole time.
The probe pivoted to Young, who was charged with Stewart’s murder last Friday.
Throughout the two-week manhunt, Lunt said Young was “acting totally normal” as if “nothing ever happened.”
Young tried to save face online as well, posting that he was “doing well” on his now-deleted Facebook page mere days after he allegedly killed Stewart.
The teen wasn’t on anyone’s radar until he decided to try and assist with the investigation, Lunt said.
The authorities quickly saw through his charade after talking with him for a handful of hours, according to the camp owner.
After Young was cuffed, Lunt combed through her security logs for the umpteenth time.
“Then I went back to surveillance cameras to see where he was at the time [of the killing] — and those surveillance videos indicated he was on the lake at the time,” she told ABC News.
Lunt admitted she knows very little about Young and his family, but said she never saw the teen interact with Stewart while they were staying at the campground.
State prosecutors moved to try Young, who is just two months shy of his 18th birthday, as an adult. The request hasn’t been decided on yet.
During his first appearance in court Friday, Young entered a denial on the charge that will be addressed again at a later hearing.
In the meantime, he is being held at a juvenile facility in part “to prevent the juvenile from inflicting bodily harm on others,” Judge Eric Walker ruled Friday.
His next hearing will be Aug. 22 in the Rockland District Court.
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