SALT LAKE CITY – Last Halloween, deer hunters in San Juan County found what a four-state dragnet of police could not: Alan Lamont "Monte" Pilon, a heavy-set, down-on-his-luck mechanic who in the summer of 1998 was one of America’s most wanted men.

Actually, the hunters found Pilon’s bleached bones propped against the trunk of a juniper tree.

A bullet hole to the skull suggested Pilon had committed suicide, adding one detail to the puzzling 1998 murder of Cortez police officer Dale Claxton.

But a recently completed report on Pilon’s remains casts doubt on the suicide theory. And with an accomplice and an arsenal of guns still missing, the mystery runs as deep as the canyons in Four Corners country.

Next month will mark two years since Pilon and Durango buddies Robert Matthew Mason and Jason Wayne McVean allegedly stole a water truck, killed Claxton during a routine traffic stop and then seriously wounded two Montezuma County sheriff’s deputies before disappearing into the rugged and remote Four Corners region.

Five days after the first shootout, Mason allegedly shot and wounded San Juan County sheriff’s Deputy Kelly Bradford. As a U.S. Army Special Forces unit – backed by some 500 city, county and state police officers – closed in, Mason probably committed suicide with a 9 mm Glock handgun found at his side, investigators say.

In October, authorities found a single gunshot had pierced Pilon’s right temple. Lying at his right side, his shooting side, was another 9 mm Glock. He had a broken ankle, fueling speculation that the Dove Creek man choose suicide over capture.

But a report delivered last month to the Utah Medical Examiner says Pilon’s fatal wound was fired into his temple at a downward angle, an improbable though not impossible wound to administer alone.

"Top down (trajectory) is fairly atypical" of suicide, says Utah Medical Examiner Todd Grey, who did not perform Pilon’s autopsy. Grey agreed to speak generally about handgun suicides but not specifically about the Pilon case, which remains under investigation.

The examiner’s report was prepared by University of Utah forensic anthropologist Shannon Novak, who painstakingly pieced together fragments of Pilon’s skull. Novak would not comment on the report. Neither would Assistant Medical Examiner Maureen Frikke, who directed Pilon’s autopsy.

San Juan County Sheriff Mike Lacy, though, says the angle of the bullet’s entry casts doubt on the suicide theory.

"It could have been the other guy, but unless we find him and he’s alive, we’ll never know for sure," Lacy said. "It’s just one of those nagging mysteries."

The bullet wound wasn’t the only troubling piece of evidence.

Among Pilon’s scattered belongings was a bulletproof Kevlar vest, a camouflage parka stuffed with pipe bombs, a military-style helmet, the Glock handgun and a semiautomatic rifle.

But there was no ammunition for the rifle or the handgun. The Glock’s magazine and chamber were empty and only one bullet casing was recovered. It may have been the housing of the fatal round, but the bullet wasn’t found.

"How can a man prepared for Armageddon die defenseless? I guess it’s like everything else in this case – little adds up," Cortez Police Chief Roy Lane said.

Hunters found Pilon’s body less than a morning’s walk from Hovenweep National Monument and the Anasazi ruins where the manhunt centered for seven days in 1998.

McVean has not been seen since the first hours of the search, and his whereabouts are especially troubling in light of the missing firearms.

The FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms have traced 31 weapons by serial number and sales slip to Pilon, McVean and Mason. But they have not recovered 25 of the weapons, including a cannon-like .50-caliber rifle, several .45-caliber handguns, a few shotguns, SKS rifles and assorted high-power weaponry.