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Woman found 8 days after wreck

Her husband says it took days to get authorities to launch a search.

SEATTLE - A woman who spent eight days trapped in a wrecked vehicle has severe injuries, but her brain function is normal and she can move her arms and legs, her physician said Friday.

Tanya Rider, 33, was found alive but dehydrated at the bottom of a steep ravine in suburban Maple Valley on Thursday, more than a week after she failed to return home from work. After being cut out of her SUV by rescuers, she was taken to a hospital, where she was in critical condition.

On Friday, her husband said he was frustrated by the red tape he had to fight to get authorities to launch a search for his wife more than a week after she disappeared.

Authorities found the Maple Valley woman after detecting the general location of her cell phone Thursday morning, then searching along the route she took home from work. They noticed some matted brush, and below it found Rider's vehicle, smashed on its side, State Patrol spokesman Jeff Merrill said.

Tanya Rider left work on Sept. 19 but never made it home. When her husband couldn't reach her, he said, he called Bellevue police to report his wife missing.

Bellevue police took the report right away but told Rider the case was out of their jurisdiction.

"I basically hounded them until they started a case and then, of course, I was the first focal point, so I tried to get myself out of the way as quickly as possible. I let them search the house. I told them they didn't have to have a warrant for anything, just ask," he said.

Thursday morning, detectives asked him to come in to sign for a search of phone records. They also asked him to take a polygraph test.

"By the time he was done explaining the polygraph test to me, the detective burst into the room with a cell phone map that had a circle on it," he said.

Authorities said they followed procedure in the case.

"It's not that we didn't take him seriously," Deputy Rodney C. Chinnick said. "We don't take every missing person report on adults. ... If we did, we'd be doing nothing but going after missing person reports."

[Last modified September 29, 2007, 01:13:26]