{"id":36405,"date":"2026-06-06T17:31:07","date_gmt":"2026-06-06T17:31:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/36405\/"},"modified":"2026-06-06T17:31:07","modified_gmt":"2026-06-06T17:31:07","slug":"missing-auburn-student-james-higginbotham-found-dead-outside-kyoto-japan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/36405\/","title":{"rendered":"Missing Auburn student James Higginbotham found dead outside Kyoto Japan"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The Auburn University student who mysteriously vanished in Japan has been found dead, his grieving family revealed Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>James \u201cWeston\u201d Higginbotham\u2019s body was discovered \u201cin a mountainous area outside of Kyoto\u201d by a volunteer search-and-rescue team, his heartbroken mother<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/nancy.higginbotham.50\/posts\/pfbid02ziddTrQ5h3QGquHD4cjJTtQ5sgcXUgNudkf9Gpdg2X6bGxMNBaJ3ZzoNJdFF1zGQl\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\"> announced on Facebook.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe are forever grateful for the time we had with our sweet, precious Weston, but cannot begin to understand what life without him will be like,\u201d wrote Nancy Higginbotham.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:0.79980469;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39600478\" width=\"472\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/28725293203727718-set-pcb-28725369257053446-129983814.jpg\" alt=\"A young man with blonde hair smiles at the camera, wearing a white patterned shirt.\" class=\"wp-image-39600478\"  \/>The body of James \u201cWeston\u201d Higginbotham \u2014 who went missing on May 29 \u2014 was discovered \u201cin a mountainous area outside of Kyoto\u201d by a volunteer search-and-rescue team. Facebook\/Nancy Higginbotham<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe grief we feel is impossible to put into words. \u2026 We will always love you, Weston.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Higginbotham\u2019s cause of death was not immediately clear.<\/p>\n<p>The 20-year-old student, who was in Japan on a family vacation, went missing on May 29 after traveling to Kyoto\u2019s Yamashina Ward in the eastern part of the city.<\/p>\n<p>Higginbotham left his parents and brother to explore the area after butting heads with his mother over her use of ChatGPT to navigate their trip,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2026\/06\/04\/world\/video\/missing-american-japan-kyoto?fbclid=IwY2xjawSRK0RleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEemi8T9s1g5w5wFUwL0HE7162MNImUwOfFL3BtFN3-WRkETcB9Ar_y_VGbKYQ_aem_oIh5stchF5DdiIefbjuk3A\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">according to CNN.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s not unusual for Weston to blow off steam, go into the woods and just explore.,\u201d Nancy told the outlet.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat\u2019s his happy place. But it was unusual that he turned off his location.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:0.70703125;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39600489\" width=\"417\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/28710277925229246-set-pcb-28710279971895708-129983941.jpg\" alt=\"Missing person poster for James &quot;Weston&quot; Higginbotham, a 20-year-old American last seen on May 29th in Kyoto, Japan.\" class=\"wp-image-39600489\"  \/>Nancy Higginbotham wrote that her family \u201ccannot begin to understand what life without him will be like.\u201d Facebook\/Nancy Higginbotham<\/p>\n<p>Hours before HIgginbotham\u2019s body was located, the gief-stricken mom stressed that the family knew he was \u201cout in these woods somewhere,\u201d describing the environment as \u201cvery dense and the terrain is steep.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Following the horrrific discovery, the family thanked those who had shared their story and aided in the search.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe outpouring of kindness and support has carried us through the darkest days of our lives,\u201d the family wrote.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThank you for your thoughts, prayers, and support. We will need them now more than ever.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Auburn University student who mysteriously vanished in Japan has been found dead, his grieving family revealed Saturday.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":36406,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[27156,8,151,26084,3719,8559],"class_list":["post-36405","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-kyoto","tag-auburn-tigers","tag-japan","tag-kyoto","tag-missing-persons","tag-students","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36405","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36405"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36405\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36405"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36405"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/japan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36405"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}