Searchers: Remains of Errol Flynn's son found

Sean Flynn, right, who was covering the war in Southeast Asia for Time magazine, is seen during operations near Ha Thanh, some 325 miles from Saigon, in South Vietnam in 1968. On the left is a Montagnard mercenary, a native hill tribesman fighting in alliance with the U.S. Special Forces.

© AP file

Forensic tests will be conducted on what two searchers believe are the remains of photographer Sean Flynn, son of Hollywood star Errol Flynn, who disappeared during the Cambodian War 40 years ago, the U.S. Embassy said Monday.

At least 37 journalists were killed or are listed as missing from the 1970-75 war, which pitted the U.S.-backed Lon Nol government against the North Vietnamese-supported Khmer Rouge.

A number of journalists were known to have been captured by the Khmer Rouge and probably executed.

U.S. Embassy spokesman John Johnson said that Australian David MacMillan and Briton Keith Rotheram handed over the remains Friday, and they were sent to the Hawaii-based Joint POW/MIA Accounting Command, or JPAC, which deals with accounting for missing Americans from past wars.

"Obviously there is nothing conclusive and tests need to be conducted," Johnson said. "Each case is different so it is difficult to speculate on how long the analysis may take."

The search for Sean Flynn and a close friend, Dana Stone, began not long after their disappearance in the province of Kampong Cham in 1970, notably by a colleague and Vietnam War-era photographer Tim Page.

Freelance "bone hunters" have also taken up the search for both missing journalists and U.S. servicemen listed as missing in Indochina. Some proved to be swindlers who demanded money from grieving families of the missing.

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