CASE FILE: #2024-0814-04B
AGENCY: OREGON STATE POLICE – DISTRICT 4 (PENDLETON)
OFFICER: DEPUTY M. JENSEN (BADGE #552)
DATE OF INCIDENT: AUGUST 14, 2024
INCIDENT TYPE: ABANDONED VEHICLE / UNATTENDED PROPERTY
LOCATION: DEPT. OF TRANSPORTATION REVENUE SITE #19 (STATE ROUTE 204, MILEPOST 14.8, UMATILLA COUNTY)

[PAGE 1 OF 3]
At approximately 06:14 AM on August 14, 2024, Dispatch received an alert from an automated system regarding a toll/weight sensor malfunction at the decommissioned weigh station near Tollgate, OR.

Responding officer arrived at 06:42 AM. A white 2018 Ford F-250 utility truck belonging to Columbia River Power & Light (License Plate: OR-882-WPL) was parked perpendicular to the scales, engine idling, driver-side door open.

A cabin search revealed electrical testing gear, an open logbook, a personal phone (battery depleted), and a half-empty thermos. No signs of struggle were present. Footprints in the gravel dust extended forty (40) feet north toward the Umatilla National Forest before disappearing due to basalt shale density.

A sweep of the area was conducted with negative results for the registered operator, Thomas E. Miller (DOB: 11/12/1984). Owner (CRPL Dispatch) was notified at 07:15 AM. Vehicle towed by Blue Mountain Recovery.

[PAGE 2 OF 3]
SUPPLEMENTAL STATEMENT – DEPUTY M. JENSEN:
Interview conducted with CRPL field supervisor Gary Vance. Vance stated Miller was checking substations between Weston and Elgin along Highway 204. Miller's last radio check-in was logged at 04:30 AM. Vance noted Miller had been with the company for eight years with no prior history of unexcused absences.

Physical evidence from the cabin was logged into [Pendleton Property Locker B](https://www.oregon.gov/osp/pages/index.aspx). Itemized list includes: One (1) Toughbook laptop, one (1) tool bag, one (1) Garmin GPS unit, and one (1) high-visibility vest.

Automated scale camera footage indicates the F-250 entered the lot at 05:02 AM. Headlights remained on high beam. No other vehicular traffic was recorded on [Highway 204](https://www.tripcheck.com/) between 04:30 AM and 06:00 AM within a five-mile radius.

I’m posting this here because my lawyer told me to stop calling the county clerk, and my wife is tired of seeing me sit at the kitchen table with three different highlighters at two in the morning. I’m a lineman. I’ve worked for Columbia River Power since 2016, mostly doing sub-transmission maintenance up in the Blues—the Blue Mountains for anyone who doesn't live near northeastern Oregon. It’s a lot of driving, a lot of pine trees, and a lot of dead cell zones. You get used to the quiet.

On August 13th, a dry lightning storm hit [Umatilla County](https://www.co.umatilla.or.us/), tripping breakers on the 230kV lines. I got called in early for the morning shift on the 14th because the Weston substation had a transformer pressure alarm go off around midnight. My supervisor, Gary, told me to take truck 882 and run the line up over Tollgate pass toward Elgin to check for branches on the right-of-way.

I started from the Pendleton yard at about 3:45 AM. I stopped at the Sinclair station on Southgate to fill my thermos and grab two breakfast burritos. The girl behind the counter, Sarah, looked exhausted. She gave me an extra five-dollar bill in change, and I handed it back. I mention that because it’s the last normal, verifiable thing that makes sense to me.

The drive up Highway 204 climbs fast into the pines. Around 4:30 AM, I did my mandatory radio check with our dispatcher, Pete.

"Truck 882 to base," I said. "Passing Milepost 12. Heavy fog in the bottoms, roads are dry. Heading for Tollgate."

"Copy that, Tom," Pete came back through the static. "We’ve got some voltage drops on the Elgin side too. Take a look at the reclosers near the old weigh station if you get a chance."

"Roger," I said. That was the last time I talked to Pete. Or the first last time. I don't know how to phrase it anymore.

Ten minutes later, around 4:40 AM, I saw an orange traffic cone sitting perfectly in the center of the yellow line near the entrance to the old, decommissioned ODOT weigh station. It looked brand new. No scuffs, no grime. I pulled the truck onto the wide concrete scale pad to turn around and pick it up so it wouldn't cause a wreck. I left the engine running, put the emergency brake on, and left my door open because I figured I’d be out for thirty seconds.

I walked down the gravel approach, picked up the cone, and turned around.

My truck wasn't there.

The headlights were still cutting through the fog, lighting up the trees across the lot. But the truck itself was about thirty yards further back, sitting right at the edge of the dark forest shale.

The lot is flat—actually, it tilts slightly toward the highway for drainage. If the parking brake had slipped, the truck should have come toward me, not gone backward. I walked across the crunchy gravel. The driver’s side door was still wide open, the dome light casting a pale yellow square on the ground. When I reached in, the brake pedal was slammed down tight against the floorboard. It hadn't slipped.

I sat down in the seat, feeling antsy. I looked at the dashboard clock. It said 5:02 AM.

That stopped me cold. I’ve lived here my whole life; walking thirty yards to pick up a plastic cone takes two minutes. But twenty minutes were gone.

I reached for the mic to call Pete. The radio was dead—the green LED display was completely dark. I pulled out my cell phone. It had full bars, but the battery icon flashed red at one percent and the screen instantly went black, even though it had been on the charger all morning. I opened my Toughbook to use the internal Wi-Fi network, but instead of the login screen, a blue command line was scrolling lines of gray text faster than I could read.

Then I noticed a sharp smell from the vents—like hot iron, or an old skillet left on a hot burner until the oil turns white. I turned the ignition key to kill the engine and check under the hood. The motor died, the headlights cut out, and the fog closed right up to the glass.

It was dead quiet. No wind, no crickets. Just the manifold cooling down.

I reached into the side door pocket for my flashlight. My hand hit something soft instead. A pair of heavy leather work gloves with yellow high-vis stripes. I didn't own these; the company issues gray cowhide. These were brand new and had my initials—T.M.—written on the cuff in black Sharpie. The handwriting looked like mine, but the "M" had a double-loop I only use when signing checks in a hurry.
A dull, throbbing pressure started behind my left ear, like a scratch from a blackberry bramble. I grabbed my regular flashlight and stepped out onto the gravel.

I walked around to the front of the truck to check the tire tracks in the dust. The marks from my Goodyear tires didn't lead from the highway to where the truck sat. They started right at the tree line, where two small lodgepole pines were bent back, their bark scraped raw at bumper height. The tracks came straight out of the thick brush, backwards, and stopped where the truck was idling. It looked like someone had driven the truck out of the forest in reverse and parked it.

"Hey!"

The voice barked out from the truck’s internal PA speaker under the dash. It was low and scratchy, but it sounded like Pete.

"Truck 882, come in. Tom, you there?"

I ran back to the cab and grabbed the mic. "Pete? Yeah, I’m here. My radio went black. Hey, I’ve got some weird stuff going on up here at the scales. The truck is—"

"Tom," a different voice interrupted. It was Gary, my supervisor, but his voice sounded flat, like he was reading off a card. "Tom, we need you to check the oil level in the rear differential. We’re seeing a temp spike on the telemetry."

"Gary?" I said. "The truck’s off. The radio screen is dead, how are you guys talking to me?"

"Just check the oil, Tom. It’s in the log. Page forty."

The speaker clicked off. The display stayed completely dark.

I looked at the logbook binder on the center console. The last entry I’d written was at 3:45 AM. But the next page was already filled out in a blocky, precise engineer's lettering that wasn't mine:

05:14 AM. Substation 14-B clear. Ground wire intact. Transformer pressure 42 PSI. Operator noted discrepancy in regional topography at Milepost 15.2. Checked rear differential. Level adequate.

Underneath, a signature said T. Miller. It looked exactly like my legal signature on my driver's license. I touched the ink; it was fresh enough to smear across the white paper.

Suddenly, a sound like a handful of gravel dropping onto a metal roof echoed through the lot. Patter-patter-click. I looked through the windshield. The 230kV aluminum power lines running parallel to the road were swinging in wide, heavy arcs like skipping ropes. There was no wind. The leaves on the elders were completely still, but the conductors were looping up and down, discharging loud static into the damp air at the bottom of every swing.

I didn't check page forty. I shoved the key in and turned it.

Nothing. The dashboard didn't even click. I pulled the hood release, grabbed my flashlight, and stepped back out.

When I propped the hood open, the engine bay was spotless. It looked like it had been steam-cleaned five minutes ago—no dust, no grease film. And the battery was gone. The black plastic tray was completely empty. The heavy red and black cables were hanging down over the wheel well, their copper terminals shiny and clean, dangling in the empty space.

I dropped the hood with a loud clang that cut through the canyon.

Through the fog, dim yellow headlights were approaching from the Weston side. An old white Chevy Caprice with faded state exempt plates slid to a stop. An ODOT car. The passenger window rolled down.

The man inside wore a green ODOT wool shirt they stopped issuing decades ago. He was old, with eyes filmed over like cataracts, staring straight ahead through the dirty glass. The driver was younger but wore the same clothes. Neither looked at me.

"You need to clear the right-of-way, sir," the driver said, his voice flat. "We’ve got a crew coming through to clear the brush at Milepost 15."

"My truck's dead," I said, leaning toward the window. The car smelled like old, damp newspapers left in a basement. "My battery’s gone. Can I get a ride or use your radio?"

The older man slowly turned his head, his cloudy eyes fixing directly on the small bump behind my left ear. "The log is clear for the 14th. We didn't find anything in the draw. You should check the rear differential."

"What?" I asked.

The driver hit the gas. The car moved away into the [Umatilla National Forest](https://www.fs.usda.gov/umatilla/) fog without a sound, leaving only that smell of damp paper in the air. I looked back at the road; the orange cone was completely gone. My Casio watch didn't show numbers anymore. The digital screen just flashed two letters every second: O.K. O.K. O.K.

I couldn't stand looking at the truck or the gloves. I started walking down the highway toward Weston. It’s a nine-mile walk to the first farmhouse, and I figured I’d make it by dawn.

I walked for hours. The fog never changed. The sky never got lighter. My watch kept blinking O.K. Every fifteen minutes, I passed a green milepost sign.

Milepost 14.8.
Milepost 14.8.
Milepost 14.8.

Every sign had the exact same little dent in the top left aluminum corner.

I don't remember getting tired. The next thing I know, it was 06:42 AM, and Deputy Jensen was shaking my shoulder.

But I wasn't on the highway. I was sitting in the driver's seat of my truck, hands on the wheel, the engine idling perfectly. The radio was playing a country station, and my phone was sitting in the cup holder, fully charged. I was wearing the new leather gloves with my initials on them.

"Miller?" Jensen asked, squinting through the window. "You alright? Base said you missed your check-in. Found your truck sitting crooked across the scales here."

"Yeah," I choked out, my throat dry as sand. "Yeah, I’m fine."

I drove back to the yard. The company put me on warehouse duty the next week because Gary said I looked burned out. A month later, my lawyer pulled the state police report to see what Jensen had logged before waking me up.

The clerk gave us three pages, but there was a gap. Page one ends with footprints heading into the forest. Page two starts mid-sentence with Gary’s office interview. There is no mention of how the truck got restarted, or what Jensen found during those twenty-eight missing minutes.

I went to the courthouse myself last week and asked to see the physical file. The clerk brought up the original ledger from the basement. The report was inside, but page two had been cleanly sliced out with a razor blade along the margin, leaving only a tiny strip of white paper trapped under the brass fastener.

At the very bottom of that remaining paper strip, someone had written four characters in blue ballpoint ink.

------------------------------
[PROPERTY CLERK NOTES - FILE #2024-0814-04B]
DOCUMENT EVIDENCE RECOVERY:
ONE (1) STANDARD SCRAP BOOKING RECEIPT RE-ROUTED TO COUNTY ROAD DEPT. DIST-3.
TIMESTAMP: 05:14:02 AM_
TEXT REMAINING ON MARGIN STRIP:
[O.K. - T.M.]***

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