A couple found the Kentucky highway shooter's remains by being bounty hunters for a week, they say

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) — Days after a shooter attacked an interstate and disappeared, leaving a Kentucky community scared and on guard, Fred and Sheila McCoy decided to lace up their boots for the first time in a long time and spend days in rugged terrain searching until, finally, they found a body.

Kentucky State Police credited Fred and Sheila McCoy, who typically spend their retired days creating YouTube videos about the Hatfield-McCoy feud, with helping investigators find what they believe are the remains of Joseph Couch. Couch, 32, is suspected of firing randomly at vehicles on Interstate 75 on Sept. 7, wounding five people.

The person believed to be Couch died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, said Kentucky’s Chief Medical Examiner, Dr. William Ralston. A soft tissue DNA test was inconclusive on the identification of the body, and testing on the bones could take up to two days, Ralston said. A toxicology test is also pending.

Teams of local, state and federal law enforcement had searched tens of thousands of acres of woods since the shooting. Authorities warned residents to be extra vigilant and some schools temporarily shifted to virtual learning.

“For one week we turned into bounty hunters,” Fred McCoy told The Associated Press on Thursday. “The more we was watching the news and saw lockdowns and school closings, the more we were compelled to search for him.”

The discovery of the remains calmed fears in the eastern Kentucky community of London, just a few miles from where the shooter perched above the highway and opened fire with an AR-15. State police said Wednesday night that the McCoys would receive a $25,000 reward for the find.

Once the identification is fully confirmed, it will “bring to a close a pretty scary time in that community and the surrounding communities,” Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear said Thursday.

“We have every reason to believe that this is Joseph Couch,” Beshear told reporters at the Kentucky Capitol in Frankfort. “But a final and determinative identification has not yet been possible.”

In a 30-minute YouTube livestream Wednesday, the McCoys are filming in dense woods after they see vultures in the air, and Sheila McCoy says she can smell a foul odor.

"Oh, Lord, this is nasty. Oh, my goodness, this is gross,” Sheila says while warning her husband to watch out for snakes.

At the end of the video, they discover the remains. “Hey, guys, you won’t believe it, we found him, oh, my goodness gracious,” Sheila McCoy says in the video.

Police were also searching the area, and the couple identified themselves to officers about 12 minutes before they found the remains. They'd also warned police and friends they'd be there, and were livestreaming on YouTube in case something went wrong, Fred McCoy said.

“We didn’t know we was going to find him like that,” he said. “We could’ve found him with a gun pointed at us.”

The McCoys live a couple of counties away from where the shooter attacked. They hadn't gone on a hike in the woods in a long time — Sheila, 59, had previously had back surgery and her husband, 66, had knee surgery — but they decided after a Friday night date to help in the search, said Fred McCoy, himself a retired police officer.

“We were just a crippled old man and crippled old woman walking in the woods,” he said Thursday. Fred McCoy said he is a descendant of a Hatfield-McCoy marriage and they run a small museum related to the history of the feud.

He estimated the remains were about a mile away from where the shooter opened fire. Nearby, police found Couch's vehicle and an AR-15 last week.

The discovery of the body put nearby residents at ease after more than a week of tension with a gunman on the loose near their homes.

“I feel a huge sense of relief,” said Heather Blankenship, a mother of three who lives near London. She saw the body in the McCoys’ video, which has grown to nearly a half-million views in less than 24 hours, and even though her anxiety is gone and her sense of normalcy has returned, it’s still sad, she said.

“I’m over here relieved that to me this monster is dead,” but meanwhile, the suspect’s family is grieving, Blankenship said.

Authorities said the shooter fired 20 to 30 rounds, creating chaos. The five victims survived, but some suffered serious injuries.

Authorities said Couch purchased the AR-15 weapon and about 1,000 rounds of ammunition at a London gun store hours before the shooting.

Laurel County Judge-Executive David Westerfield sensed a collective sigh of relief among residents.

"They feel like they can go back to their normal lifestyle,” he said.

In this photo made from video provided by Sheila and Fred McCoy shows the couple while searching for the remains of a suspected highway shooter in London, Ky., Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2024. (Sheila and Fred McCoy via AP)

In this photo made from video provided by Sheila and Fred McCoy shows the couple while searching for the remains of a suspected highway shooter in London, Ky., Wednesday, Sept. 18, 2024. (Sheila and Fred McCoy via AP)

MAGDEBURG, Germany (AP) — Germany on Saturday was still in shock and struggling to understand the suspect behind the attack in the city of Magdeburg.

Identified by local media as 50-year-old Taleb A., a psychiatry and psychotherapy specialist, authorities said he has been living in Germany for two decades. He was arrested on site after plowing a black BMW into a Christmas market crowded with holiday shoppers Friday evening, killing at least five people and wounding about 200 others.

Prominent German terrorism expert Peter Neumann posted on X that he had yet to come across a suspect in an act of mass violence with that profile.

Taleb’s X account is filled with tweets and retweets focusing on anti-Islam themes and criticism of the religion while sharing congratulatory notes to Muslims who left the faith. He also described himself as a former Muslim.

He was critical of German authorities, saying they had failed to do enough to combat the “Islamism of Europe.”

He has also voiced support for the far-right and anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.

Some described Taleb as an activist who helped Saudi women flee their homeland. Recently, he seemed focused on his theory that German authorities have been targeting Saudi asylum seekers.

Neumann, the terrorism expert, wrote: “After 25 years in this ‘business’ you think nothing could surprise you anymore. But a 50-year-old Saudi ex-Muslim who lives in East Germany, loves the AfD and wants to punish Germany for its tolerance towards Islamists — that really wasn’t on my radar."

On Saturday, German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser told reporters: “At this point, we can only say for sure that the perpetrator was evidently Islamophobic – we can confirm that. Everything else is a matter for further investigation and we have to wait.”

A German-based organization called Athiest Refugee Relief said the alleged attacker was not a part of the group and claimed that he made “numerous accusations and claims” against it and former board members, which it said were false.

“We distance ourselves from him in the strongest terms," the group said in a statement on its website, adding that members of Atheist Refugee Relief filed a criminal complaint against him in 2019 following “the most foul slander and verbal attacks."

An image taken from a video shows police officers arresting a suspect after car drove into a crowd at the Christmas market in Magdeburg, Germany, Friday Dec. 20, 2024. (TNN/DPA via AP)

A person stands by flowers and candles placed outside St. John's Church near a Christmas Market, where a car drove into a crowd on Friday evening, in Magdeburg, Germany, Saturday, Dec. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi)