Hannah Kobayashi returns to the US after sparking massive manhunt
The 30-year-old Maui photographer was found safe in Mexico last week
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Hannah Kobayashi, the Hawaiian woman who mysteriously vanished last month sparking a massive manhunt, is back in the United States, according to a new report.
The 30-year-old photographer from Maui was found safe in Mexico last week. Now, she has returned to California and is said to be in good health and not under any duress, TMZ reported on Monday.
Kobayashi first went missing on November 8 while traveling from Hawaii to New York City via LAX for what she described as a “bucket list” trip.
However, she missed her connecting flight to New York, and family members and friends became concerned when they began receiving bizarre messages sent from Kobayashi’s phone.
They began to fear she was a victim of kidnapping or human trafficking and launched a desperate search to find her, flocking to LA, handing out flyers and keeping her story in the public eye.
Police later declared her a “voluntary missing person,” saying that she had been captured on surveillance footage walking across the southern border into Mexico.
While the family was dealing with the heartache of Kobayashi’s disappearance, her father Ryan Kobayashi, who had been adamant about finding his daughter, was found dead near LAX in the early hours of November 24 of an apparent suicide.
On December 11, Kobayashi was finally located and her family was informed of the good news by the LAPD.
Kobayashi has not spoken publicly and it is still unclear what she was doing in Mexico.