Three bodies found in Mexico during search for missing American, Australians
Three bodies were found in Baja California, Mexico, during a search for three missing men, including one American, the state’s top prosecutor’s office announced Friday.
The statement from the office of the attorney general of Baja California did not say whether the three bodies had been identified as those of the missing men, but it added: “This was done as part of the search for two Australians and one American reported missing.”
The office said on its website that an arrest warrant had been issued for the crime of forced disappearance and that three people were being investigated.
Carter Rhoad of San Diego and Australian brothers Jake and Callum Robinson, identified by local outlets, had not been heard from since April 27 while on a surfing vacation. Debra Robinson, Jake and Callum’s mother, posted in a Facebook group Wednesday asking whether anyone had seen her sons, noting that she hadn’t heard from them since April 27. She said they had not showed up to an Airbnb reservation.
“Callum is a type one diabetic so there is also a medical concern,” she wrote with a picture that said, “this is a very dire situation.”
She and the men’s father planned to come to North America, Australian outlet 7 News reported Friday.
“Surfing is a passion they both share,” the parents told 7 News in a statement. “Our only comfort right now is that they were together doing something they passionately love.”
Authorities had found the truck the men had been driving, their tents and one of their cellphones. The truck had been burned.
The FBI, which is assisting with the investigation, said in an unsigned statement that the bodies were found in Santo Tomás, a town about a two-hour drive from the U.S.-Mexico border.
Photos from the scene show rescuers working in a waterhole on cliffs near the water as Mexican marines and national guard members stand by.
The FBI said it was in contact with the family of the U.S. citizen, though it did not name Rhoad.
“We are steadfast with our international law enforcement partners in finding answers,” the FBI’s San Diego field office said in the statement Friday.
An unsigned email from the State Department said American authorities were “aware of those reports” and are monitoring the situation but had no further comment. The State Department’s website urges Americans to reconsider travel to Baja California state because of crime and kidnapping; the Australian government advises travelers to “exercise a high degree of caution” because of violence in Mexico.
Last year, four Americans were kidnapped in northern Mexico outside Brownsville, Texas, in a case that sharpened the U.S. focus on insecurity across the border, where armed groups operate just across the Rio Grande. Two were found dead, while two survived and later recounted the violent kidnapping.
At the time, the Washington Post reported that 550 more Americans were missing in Mexico, underscoring a crisis of violence and government dysfunction that had left at least 112,150 people missing as of March 2023.