The body of a man suspected of shooting and wounding five people on Interstate 75 in Kentucky was found on Wednesday, authorities said, ending an intense search.
Kentucky State Police Commissioner Phillip Burnett said accessories found with the body have led authorities to conclude that it is Joseph Couch, of Woodbine, Kentucky.
“We are very confident this brings the closure to the search for Joseph Couch,” he said.
The discovery came after a lengthy search of the rugged and hilly terrain in the area of southeastern Kentucky where the September 7 attack happened near London, a city of about 8,000 people about 75 miles south of Lexington.
Investigators were working to identify the body, state police Master Trooper Scottie Pennington said earlier in a social media post.
“People have been in fear,” Laurel County Sheriff John Root said. “That’s not the normal here in Laurel County. So now that this has been discovered, I hope that our county can get back to what’s normal.
“I’d rather he’d been alive and he could have paid for what he’s done.”
The highway shootings led officials to shut some schools and shift to virtual learning for several days as authorities warned area residents to be vigilant. Schools reopened on Tuesday with extra police security in the county where the shooting happened.
Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear has called the shootings an “act of violence and evil”.
A dozen vehicles were struck as the gunman fired 20 to 30 rounds near an interstate exit. The five victims survived the attack but some suffered serious injuries.
After sending the text message vowing to “kill a lot of people” before the attack, Couch sent another saying, “I’ll kill myself afterwards,” investigators said in the affidavit.
The document did not describe the relationship between Couch and the woman who received the texts, although they have a child together but were never married, according to an attorney who handled the custody arrangement for the couple and their son born in 2016.
Searchers found Couch’s abandoned vehicle near the crime scene and a semi-automatic weapon that investigators believe was used in the shooting. An army-style duffel bag that was found had “Couch” handwritten in marker and a phone believed to be Couch’s was found but the battery had been taken out.
Authorities said he purchased the AR-15 weapon and about 1,000 rounds of ammunition at a London gun store hours before the shooting.
Couch had a military background in the Army Reserve. The US Army said he served from 2013 to 2019 as a combat engineer. He was a private when he left and had no deployments.
The search focused on a densely wooded area about eight miles north of London that a state police official described as “walking in a jungle.” Aided by helicopters and drones, search teams on the ground contended with cliffs, sinkholes, caves, waterways and thick brush.
Authorities said they were inundated with tips from the public and followed up on each one. When the ground search was suspended at night, specially trained officers were deployed in strategic locations in the woods to prevent the gunman from slipping out of the area.
On Tuesday, authorities said they were pulling searchers from the woods to bolster patrols in nearby communities in hopes of calming fears among residents.
Police received more than 400 tips since the shooting, with most pointing to areas outside the sprawling forest that was the focus of the search.
