Julian Sands' family has issued a heartbreaking statement as the human remains found at a search site were yesterday confirmed to be his.
The devastating news was confirmed on Tuesday (June 27) by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department to the PA news agency, ITV News reports.
The 65-year-old British actor - who is best known for his roles in Ocean's Thirteen, Arachnophobia, 24, and A Room With A View - went missing in January this year while on a hike on Mount Baldy in California.
Over the weekend, hikers climbing the same mountain Sands had been on six months ago made a grim discovery after finding a set of human remains. Authorities confirmed the discovery on Saturday morning, per The Guardian. The San Bernardino County Sheriff’s Department stated the remains were set to be transferred to the coroner's office for formal identification.
According to reports from the Independent, Sands' three adult children - son Henry from his previous marriage to journalist Sarah Harvey and daughters Imogen and Natalya with his wife Evgenia Citkowitz - were part of the ground search to locate their missing father.
Following the discovery, a statement was released by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department on Tuesday said, via Sky News: "The identification process for the body located on Mt. Baldy on 24 June, 2023, has been completed and was positively identified as 65-year-old Julian Sands of North Hollywood. The manner of death is still under investigation, pending further test results."
Last week, Sands' family stated that they would continue to keep the actor "in our hearts with bright memories," writing: "We are deeply grateful to the search teams and co-ordinators who have worked tirelessly to find Julian. We continue to hold Julian in our hearts with bright memories of him as a wonderful father, husband, explorer, lover of the natural world and the arts, and as an original and collaborative performer."
In the six months following Sands' disappearance, search efforts struggled due to poor conditions in the local area and were even stopped in March due to the risk of avalanches. The sheriff's department had previously revealed that there had been a total of eight searches to locate Sands during this time, adding that volunteer searcher hours had been over 500 hours.
Earlier this year, California was hit with a series of winter storms, including mudslides in Montecito, as well as flooding and even snowfall. The Mount Baldy area, where Sands had been hiking, saw 14 search and rescue missions in the weeks leading up to the actor's disappearance, with two hikers dying on the mountain.
Sands had been living in California since 2020, and is remembered by those who knew him as someone with a passion for the outdoors and hiking.
