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Recovered Rifle in Cardboard Box

Overhead night photograph of a bolt-action rifle with a mounted telescopic scope lying inside an open light-brown cardboard box on green grass, lit by a concentrated flashlight beam, with the toe of a dark shoe visible at the upper left

What This Image Shows​

An overhead photograph shows a bolt-action rifle with a mounted telescopic scope lying inside an open, plain light-brown cardboard box set on green grass. A concentrated flashlight beam picks the weapon out of the dark, and the toe of a dark shoe is visible at the upper left of the frame. The rifle has a dark stock with a ribbed rubber recoil pad, a lighter metal barrel and action, a closed bolt handle, and a scope mounted in black rings.

The weapon named in the charging documents is a Mauser Model 98 in .30-06 Springfield, bolt-action, with a scope, reported recovered in a wooded area north of the Utah Valley University campus after the shooting. Its dimensions are what make it central to the argument over whether one person could have carried it onto campus unseen: roughly 43 to 49 inches assembled, and still about 28 to 32 inches as a barreled action once the stock is removed, with removal requiring a screwdriver rather than a tool-free takedown.

What this photograph does not establish is where it was taken or by whom, and readers should not assume it is an evidence-response photograph unless a filing says so. Compare it with the weapon imagery in Gun Found, then read Weapon and Rifle, Gun Discovery Sequence and Backpack and Rifle Impossibility.

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