Alma Tolman, disappeared April 28, 1998. Located June 1998, Antelope Island, Utah.

Revised July 2024

Alma Tolman's brother, Tom, dropped him off on Antelope Island in Utah on Tuesday, April 28, 1998, and planned to pick him up on Friday, May 1st. When Tom Tolman returned, all he found was Tolman's empty tent and camping gear. His backpack and canteen were gone as he had been on a day hike. He waited for several hours at the campsite before calling the police.

Antelope Island, with an area of 42 square miles, is the largest of 10 islands located within the Great Salt Lake, Utah,

Alma Tolman’s trip to Antelope Island

Alma planned to move to Italy on June 20th and marry an Italian woman a few weeks later. He was trying to get in some camping before he left. He was an Eagle Scout and an experienced outdoorsman, although he had never visited Antelope Island.

Everything about Alma Tolman's disappearance was out of character. He was one of nine children, an LDS Church missionary and an active church member. He didn't have any health problems or suffer from depression and had money in the bank that he'd saved for his married life.

Search and rescue teams looked for Alma for about 24 hours but never found a trace of him. Searchers used a helicopter from the Salt Lake County Sheriff's Office to look from the air, a boat combed the island's shores, and more than 50 rescue workers and two dogs searched the island's terrain on foot.

Tolman may have drowned in the Great Salt Lake, but investigators thought that possibility was remote as searchers in the boat would have found him. Crews also looked around the island's cliffs, exploring the possibility that he fell while hiking, but didn't find anything either.

Faked disappearance

Anderson said several individuals saw a man fitting Tolman's description near the island's gate and at a 7-Eleven in Syracuse. However, none made contact with that person. A cheque belonging to Alma was cashed at West Valley Walmart a few days later, which led police to believe he was alive and well, but friends and family heard nothing from him.

Investigators were suspicious and later found he engineered the disappearance to escape the upcoming wedding in Italy. The search had cost tens of thousands of dollars in personnel and donated equipment. You would have thought there was an easier way to avoid a marriage than to engineer a distressing disappearance!

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