Family Searches for Answers After Couple Shot Dead in Utah Mountains

Investigators appear no closer to finding a suspect in the shooting deaths of a lesbian couple in the Utah mountains near Moab last week, but family members have revealed more information about women’s last days and the discovery of their bodies.

Kylen Schulte, 24, and Crystal Turner, 38, also known as Crystal Beck, were last seen leaving a tavern in Moab on August 15, as CrimeOnline previously reported. Schulte’s aunt, Bridget Calvert, told Fox 13 that the pair had converted a van into a camper, calling the outdoor area around the city home.

But when neither showed up for work two days in a row, friends and family members knew something was wrong.

Calvert said police searched local camping areas, but friends of the couple knew they preferred more primitive campsites, and one of them launched her own search, heading into the La Sal Mountains southeast of Moab.

That friend found the couple’s converted Kia Wednesday, four days after they were last seen.

“She was on the phone with my brother (Schulte’s father) when she pulled up to the car,” Calvert said.

The woman saw a body at the campsite and immediately called the Grand County Sheriff’s Office. Deputies located the second body.

Grand County Sheriff’s Captain Shan Hackwell said investigators have not identified a suspect, but “evidence that we’ve gathered at this time, that’s what it’s led us to believe was an isolated incident.”

CrimeOnline reported earlier that Beck and Schulte had called friends after leaving the tavern on August 15, mentioning a man near their campsite who was “creeping them out.” But Calvert said they women had spoken about the man earlier in the week and brought him up again during their night at the tavern.

“They said they were going to go move, they were going to go pack up and move their campsite — that he was still creeping them out,” she said.

Hackwell asked that anyone who may have seen something suspicious in the South Mesa area in the days leading up to the women’s disappearance and death should call the sheriff’s office at 435-259-8115.

Meanwhile, Calvert said the family is determined to remember the newlyweds — they were married in April — and “let their love-light shine.”

“They had the most beautiful love, and that light is not stopping,” she said.

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[Featured image: Kylen Schulte, left, and Crystal Beck/Facebook]