Overview
- Family posted Saturday that search teams located the body of 20-year-old James “Weston” Higginbotham in a mountainous area outside Kyoto and expressed grief and thanks to volunteers.
- Higginbotham vanished after separating from his family on May 29 following an argument with his mother, and CCTV footage and Life360 phone data last placed him near Yamashina on a path toward hiking trails before his phone stopped reporting.
- Japanese police conducted an intense 72-hour search involving more than 100 officers, K-9 units and helicopters but were slowed by a typhoon and waist-deep mud, after which they scaled back official resources.
- The family obtained police permission to coordinate citizen searches, launched a GoFundMe, solicited experienced hikers and planned to hire private search-and-rescue teams to continue looking where authorities had eased operations.
- U.S. officials including the Embassy in Japan and the FBI were notified and available to assist, and authorities have not yet released cause of death or detailed investigative findings so further official updates are expected.