Surprising surveillance footage reveals Hannah Kobayashi shopping for a bus ticket to the southern border the day earlier than police mentioned she crossed over by way of a tunnel into Mexico.
The footage reveals Kobayashi carrying a sweatsuit and buying a ticket with money at LA Union Station on Nov. 11, based on a nonetheless obtained by Fox 11 Los Angeles. She additionally seems to have her passport and baggage along with her on the ticket counter.
Kobayashi is believed to have then reached the San Ysidro border crossing on Nov. 12, the place she entered Mexico, Los Angeles Police Chief Jim McDonnell mentioned throughout a press convention Monday.
The picture comes because the aspiring photographer’s disappearance took a curious flip after the Los Angeles police declared the 30-year-old a “voluntary lacking individual” and mentioned she willfully crossed into Mexico to “step away from trendy connectivity.”
McDonnell mentioned investigators reviewed numerous surveillance footage and interviewed a number of witnesses, who confirmed Kobayashi’s actions from when she landed within the Golden State on Nov. 8 to when she was final seen crossing into Mexico on Nov. 12.
“We’ve mainly finished all the pieces we will do at this level,” McDonnell mentioned, citing US Customs and Border Safety surveillance footage exhibiting Kobayashi crossing the border Nov. 12.
“She’s left the nation and in one other nation now.”
McDonnell mentioned that the LAPD’s investigation wouldn’t proceed into Mexico however urged the general public to return ahead with any credible details about her whereabouts.
Kobayashi went lacking on Nov. 8 after catching a flight from Hawaii to Los Angeles, with a connecting flight that will in the end take her to New York, the place she deliberate to go to family members.
After she landed at LAX, she despatched cryptic textual content messages to mates shortly earlier than her disappearance, together with one saying she’d had a “very intense religious awakening” and one other claiming “deep hackers wiped my identification, stole all my funds.”
Nevertheless, McDonnell mentioned investigators discovered “video proof clearly reveals Hannah at LAX, showing unhurt after arriving from Maui on Nov. 8 of this yr.”
“For unknown causes, she determined to not board her prescheduled flight to New York,” he mentioned.
McDonnell revealed that his division’s investigation discovered no proof that Kobayashi was being trafficked or concerned in any legal exercise.
“She has a proper to her privateness,” McDonnell continued. “And we respect her decisions. However we additionally perceive the priority her family members really feel for her. A easy message might reassure those that care about her.”
Lt. Douglas Oldfield, who works within the division’s Lacking Individuals Unit, mentioned Kobayashi’s social media exercise additionally led them to consider she “wished to disconnect” from the fashionable world.
“By taking a look at her previous social media, we then noticed indications that there have been some needs or posts that will be constant in anyone who would have the need to disconnect from their cellphone,” Oldfield mentioned on the press convention.
Oldfield additionally shared that the video confirmed her in San Ysidro and coming into Mexico by way of the border crossing tunnel in Baja California.
Baja is a vacationer vacation spot for surfers, solo vacationers, and psychedelic retreats, however has been a gateway for organized crime, violence, medicine, kidnappings, and murders, significantly in Tijuana, the most important border metropolis in Mexico which Kobayashi crossed into.
Nevertheless, Kobayashi’s household insisted the search is “removed from over” regardless of the declaration that she was thought-about voluntarily lacking on Tuesday.
“We’re deeply grateful for the urgency and dedication regulation enforcement has proven in investigating Hannah’s disappearance,” the household mentioned in an announcement.
“Our household stays hopeful that Hannah is protected, and urges everybody to proceed the search.”
Her household believes that the seek for their cherished one is “removed from over,” and they’re “dedicated to doing all the pieces potential to carry her dwelling safely.”
Kobayashi’s household has been grappling with one other tragedy together with the 30-year-old’s disappearance.
Her father, Ryan Kobayashi, was amongst a number of members of the family who traveled to Los Angeles to assist with the search.
He was discovered useless in a car parking zone close to LAX on Nov. 24, with officers ruling the loss of life a suicide.
If you happen to or somebody you already know is affected by any of the problems raised on this story, name the Nationwide Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-TALK (8255) or textual content Disaster Textual content Line at 741741.
