Minnesota sheriff hopes for answers in 44-year-old case

BEMIDJI, Minn. — Authorities in Bemidji are following a tip they hope will be a break in a missing child case from 1982. Police spent Friday, Oct. 23, searching a home near where 3-year-old Kevin Ayotte went missing 44 years ago. Kevin disappeared from his family's summer cabin about 25 minutes northeast of Bemidji on Sept. 30, 1982. Beltrami County Sheriff Jason Riggs said he hopes investigators can recover the boy's remains in the "near future." "Being able to provide closure for them (Kevin's family) is paramount," he said. In 1982, officials conducted a nine-day search for Kevin around his family's summer cabin tucked in a wooded and boggy area off County Highway 20 in Sugar Bush Township in Beltrami County. The young boy, who was nonverbal and deaf, vanished along with his dog when his mother stepped out of the house for a brief moment. His brother was inside the home. The dog came back five days later, but there was never a clue of what happened