The body of Timothy Hamlett—the 20-year-old college junior who was reported missing in December—has been found in New York City’s Hudson River, the New York Daily News reports. Officials have ruled his death a suicide.
Hamlett was a student-athlete at the University of Pennsylvania on the school’s track team. His parents reported him missing after expecting him to come home for the holidays. Hamlett’s parents encouraged Hamlett to withdraw from school because of behavioral changes they say they saw in their son. He became aggressive, they say, and became addicted to male-enhancement pills and energy supplements.
Hamlett’s mother, Katherine Hamlett, described the closure she feels knowing what happened to her son, but also the confusion surrounding his death.
“It’s very difficult to comprehend. It’s like a foreign language, but a foreign language that you don’t even share the alphabet for,” Katherine Hamlett said. “It’s that level of disconnect for how it even came to this point.”
Timothy Hamlett’s last-known whereabouts were traced to the city’s George Washington Bridge, from which, it is believed, he jumped to his death. Officials said his last-known cellphone service was near the bridge. His wallet was found nearby in a dumpster.
Katherine Hamlett urged officials to put up barricades so that people wouldn't be able to jump off the bridge. A representative from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey told the Daily News that a project is under way to place fences in certain locations on the bridge to prevent suicide jumps.
Read more at the New York Daily News.