Stanford professor Hunter Fraser who vanished on hike is found

A California professor who went missing for several days on a 40-mile hike ahead of a scheduled domestic violence court hearing was “self-rescued” with help from fellow hikers over the weekend, officials said.

Hunter Fraser, 44, was located in Washington state’s Olympic National Park on Saturday — a day after he was slated to appear in a California court over allegations he assaulted his girlfriend last year.

Fraser, a Professor of Biology at Stanford University, had been reported missing by his family last Wednesday after he failed to return, as planned, from the two-day hike, the Clallam County Sheriff’s Office said.

Authorities launched a widespread, multi-day search involving about 90 rescue personnel after Fraser’s family said they’d last heard from him via text on Tuesday morning and his car was located at the beginning of the trail.

Then, on Saturday, park officials said they were notified that Fraser — who they earlier described as an “extremely skilled solo hiker” — had been found.

Fraser “self-rescued via the Dosewallips River Trail with the assistance of other hikers,” according to park officials — meaning he wasn’t found by the search and rescue teams.

“He was driven to Quilcene, WA where his family, park personnel, and medical responders met him,” the officials said.

It wasn’t immediately clear if Fraser injured himself on the hike, or if there was another reason for his delayed return.

The sheriff’s office didn’t immediately respond to The Post.

The professor’s brief disappearance comes as the domestic violence criminal case against him unfolds in the courts.

Fraser was slapped with a misdemeanor domestic violence charge after he allegedly threw his girlfriend to the floor and slammed a door on her chest in July 2022 while playing with their daughter, the Stanford Daily reported.

The girlfriend allegedly suffered two fractured ribs, according to the police report obtained by the outlet.

Fraser, who had a preliminary hearing scheduled in Santa Clara Superior Court last Friday, has previously denied the allegations leveled against him.

“While I am prevented from going into details here while the case is pending, I do want you to know that the allegations against me are untrue,” Fraser wrote in an email to his lab.

“At no point in my career or in my personal life has anyone ever made such an accusation or allegation against me before. This has all been incredibly jarring.”

Fraser is due back in court on June 28 for another hearing in the case, court records show.