American student, James “Weston” Higginbotham, who went missing during family vacation, was found dead.
According to CNN, search-and-rescue volunteers in Japan have found the body of an Auburn University student who went missing during a family vacation, his family said, marking a tragic end to a frantic dayslong search across forested mountains.
James “Weston” Higginbotham, 20, was found dead Saturday outside Kyoto, his family announced in a social media post.
“Our family is heartbroken to share that Weston was found deceased by a volunteer search-and-rescue group in a mountainous area outside of Kyoto. The grief we feel is impossible to put into words,” the family wrote.
A passionate naturalist, Weston vanished May 29 after leaving his parents and brother to explore Kyoto on his own after butting heads with his mother over her use of ChatGPT, and the natural resources such AI requires, to navigate their trip.
Using the Life360 app to track his location, his parents saw that Weston got on a train and visited several stores.
His mother said, they texted him to ask where he was going, and his location was turned off shortly afterward, which was out of character for him.
Weston was last seen on CCTV footage walking alone in the city’s Yamashina area, on a path that led to a hiking trail in the nearby woods.
On Saturday the Higginbothams launched their own search efforts, with help from local residents and a hired search-and-rescue team to focus on areas of the forests of Yamashina that police did not search.
Following the discovery of Weston’s body, the family thanked those who had shared their story and aided in the search.
