WENATCHEE, Wash. — As a search continued this week for a former U.S. Army soldier suspected of killing his three young daughters, the girls’ mother is focused on improving the state’s Amber Alert system and providing adequate mental health care to veterans, her attorney said.

“The more attention we can bring to these issues, the more it will heal her because she literally cares about nothing else in this moment but fixing these two things,” attorney Arianna Cozart said.

The three sisters — Olivia Decker, 5; Evelyn Decker, 8; and Paityn Decker, 9 — were reported missing Friday by their mother, Whitney Decker. She told police that her ex-husband, 32-year-old Travis Decker, had not returned them as outlined in their custody agreement and was not answering the phone. The girls’ bodies were found Monday near an abandoned campsite outside Leavenworth and police believe they died from asphyxiation.

The FBI, Homeland Security Investigations, U.S. Marshals and U.S. Border Patrol have all joined in the search for Travis Decker, including by investigating possible sightings locally and in other states, said Chelan County Sheriff Mike Morrison at a news conference Wednesday. He said investigators have learned Decker is well-versed in outdoor survival and has experience caching supplies.

Whitney Decker, her family and her ex-husband’s family are all cooperating with the investigation but have requested privacy. She agreed to allow Cozart to speak on her behalf.

Cozart said Travis Decker, who was diagnosed with complex post-traumatic stress disorder and a borderline personality disorder after leaving active service, has been struggling with deteriorating mental health.

“As soon as he didn’t bring those girls back at 8 o’clock, she knew something was going on,” Cozart said of Whitney Decker.

“There should be enough concern for the police to say, ‘These children are missing, they are in substantial danger, even though he didn’t issue an overt threat,’ ” she said, noting Wenatchee police had wanted an Amber Alert issued but were told by the State Patrol that the case didn’t meet the required threshold.

The State Patrol instead issued an Endangered Missing Persons Advisory for the girls. Unlike Amber Alerts, these advisories do not send out cellphone alerts in targeted areas. Both Amber Alerts and Endangered Missing Persons Advisories are distributed through flyers, broadcast on highway reader boards and sent to law enforcement agencies.

Chris Loftis, a State Patrol spokesperson, previously said that because Decker has custodial rights, there was not an immediate legal presumption of abduction or that the children were in danger.

Decker’s declining mental health and out-of-character behavior in not returning the girls as planned should’ve been considered enough of a threat to issue the Amber Alert, said Cozart.

“We may never know if it could’ve meant the difference between life and death for those girls … but it could’ve made a huge difference,” she said.

Cozart said Travis Decker had been desperately seeking mental health services from Veterans Affairs and a veterans crisis line but was ultimately left to struggle in isolation.

“When you have a vet who is suffering from complex PTSD and other mental health issues, they do not have the mental bandwidth” to schedule needed exams and evaluations, she said. “This was a tragedy that could’ve been completely avoided with proper funding of mental health services for veterans.

“Whitney believes, as I do, that something broke inside of him,” Cozart said. “Travis would not have done what he did if he was himself. He clearly had some sort of break and everything that he had been living with, everything that had been bottled up inside of him for so long as far as trauma, just won out.”

Morrison, the Chelan County sheriff, appeared to believe the same thing.

Asked at Wednesday’s news conference whether investigators had determined a motive, Morrison said, “I don’t think there would be any motive that would be acceptable. … I mean clearly, it’s not the decision of a sound mind.”

He said Decker might have attended mountain survival school while in the Army but noted he’s been an outdoorsman since he was a kid and knows how to conceal himself. Helicopters and drones have been used to search by air, a swift water rescue team searched Icicle Creek on Wednesday, SWAT teams have been deployed to check unoccupied cabins and residences, and deputies in neighboring Kittitas County are also scouring trails for any sign of Decker, Morrison said.

“We recognize that 87% of our county is not accessible by road. … We are well aware of our terrain,” he said.

The Sheriff’s Office is asking anyone with information related to the search for Decker to call a tip line or submit information. The office said it is not clear whether Decker is armed, and he should be considered dangerous. Anyone who sees him or believes they have seen him in the last few days should not approach him and should call 911, the office said.

With autopsy results expected Thursday, Morrison said investigators will likely have a better of idea when the girls died and just how much of a head start Decker had on the officials searching for him.

A community in mourning

While the search for Decker continues in the woods and hills surrounding the Wenatchee Valley and beyond, residents are doing what they can to support Whitney Decker, though many in this city of 35,000 have never met her in person.

Patti Howe, who owns the iconic Ernie’s Market on South Miller Street with her husband, was in the middle of hanging black privacy mesh along the market’s chain link fence when her sister ran out of the store Tuesday morning with news that the Decker girls had been found dead.

“As a mom, as a woman, as a nurse, I needed to do something,” said Howe, who immediately contacted Lincoln Elementary School, where the Decker sisters were enrolled. “They said they’d make sure Whitney got whatever I brought in.”

Howe went to the school to deliver flowers donated by a customer and learned the principal and a counselor had gone classroom to classroom to deliver the news of the girls’ deaths.

“It was solemn and sad” and kids walked the halls with “shoulders drooped,” she said. “It’s too early (for them) to have such a heartache.”

Howe’s sister, Allison Chamberlain, who manages Ernie’s Market, found a jar in the store, decorated it with photos of the Decker sisters and put it on the counter to collect cash donations for the girls’ mother.

“The first couple gentlemen who came in, we shared we were taking donations and there was a heavy feeling. They were throwing money in the jar and saying, ‘I have daughters,’ ” Chamberlain said.

Though Wenatchee is growing, “it’s still a small town,” she said. “Nothing can happen in this area without people feeling it.”

Customers continued to share their shock and grief, and while some have expressed wanting the worst for Travis Decker, “others are saying the system failed both the mom and dad,” Chamberlain said. “The VA in town doesn’t have adequate (psychiatric services) and, even for civilians, there’s not enough basic mental health care available.”

Chamberlain is organizing a shaved ice fundraiser at the store on June 13 to benefit Whitney Decker. Meanwhile, Howe reached out to Cindy Gonzalez, the owner of The Bloom Flowery, and together the women recruited several other business owners who are also collecting cash donations through Tuesday.

Brettany Huber, with her 4-year-old daughter Wyatt in tow, stopped by Gonzalez’s downtown flower shop to pick up a donation box for Simply Unique, a home décor and consignment store owned by Huber’s mother-in-law.

Huber and her husband donated to a GoFundMe fundraiser that, as of Wednesday evening, had raised nearly $650,000 for Whitney Decker. But she wants to do all she can to help.

“Money doesn’t bring them back, but if it can make things a little easier and take things off her plate while she heals, we want to do what we can.”

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