By  Seamus McGraw

November 2, 2006

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BISHOP,Calif. (Crime Library) — For several weeks last summer, local and national media attention was riveted on the disappearance — and as it turned out, the death  — of Renee Fox, a young mother who wandered off into the high desert near Bishop, Calif., only to be found dead weeks later not far from her abandoned car.

But Renee, who authorities believe succumbed to the heat and exhaustion and probably wasn't the victim of foul play, was not the only young woman to have died in that remote desert last summer. (See related story: http://www.crimelibrary.com/news/original/0806/1801_renee_fox_body.html )

And while Renee's case may ultimately prove to be a tragic accident, authorities are less certain about the circumstances surrounding the death of a local woman named Shaleen Duckey.

Shaleen, who according to some accounts appeared to have struggled with a drug problem, vanished in late July, more than a month after Renee disappeared. Two weeks later, Shaleen's body was found in a relatively secluded area just south of the high desert town of Bishop, said Sgt. Marston Motweiler of the Inyo County Sheriff's Department.

But unlike Renee, whose sun-bleached remains showed no sign of trauma when they were recovered in mid-August, Shaleen appeared to have suffered fatal injuries.

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