Body of Joseph Couch, who shot drivers on I-75 in Kentucky, found in nearby woods

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The body of a man accused of shooting five people in vehicles on Interstate 75 earlier this month in Southern Kentucky, setting off a massive manhunt, was found Wednesday afternoon near the crime scene.

Joseph Couch, 32, was found near Exit 49 on the interstate, about nine miles north of London, near where he shot 12 vehicles on Sept. 7. The scene was about 65 miles south of Lexington on one of the nation’s busiest highways.

Police said the items found on the body indicate it’s Couch, and a full identification will be confirmed Thursday.

“We are very confident this brings the closure to the search for Joseph Couch,” Phillip Burnett Jr., commissioner of Kentucky State Police, said in a news conference in London Wednesday night.

Two people streaming live on YouTube discovered the body on Wednesday and alerted police. Police said they could not yet determine how long the body had been in the woods.

Police also said they had not yet determined Couch’s cause of death, but an unspecified weapon was found near his body.

The shootings set off a massive manhunt for Couch in the rugged terrain of the Daniel Boone National Forest. Businesses locked their doors, and schools canceled classes and athletic events. As the hunt entered a second week, authorities announced Tuesday they were retreating from the woods and putting more resources on patrols instead.

At Wednesday’s news conference, officials stressed the importance of returning to normalcy.

“People have been in fear, and that is not the norm in Laurel County,” county Sheriff John Root said Wednesday. “Now that the body has been discovered, I hope we can get back to what is normal.”

Root added that Couch’s family was cooperative during the manhunt, and he urged residents to pray for his and the victim’s families.

“Through this investigation, they have worked with us. Everything we have asked, they have done,” Root said. “I have children of my own, and I hope and pray to God that they take the right paths. The family cannot be blamed for the misfortune that this guy has caused.”

KSP announced at 4:18 p.m. that a body had been found and they were working to identify it. The announcement came about an hour after a couple named Fred and Sheila McCoy posted a live YouTube video claiming they’d found Couch after searching for six days and nights.

In the video, the couple said they could see vultures circling nearby. They commented on a foul smell as they walked toward the vultures, and then Fred shouted, “Oh, I got him!”

Sheila replied, “Oh, my ‘Lanta! Oh, my ‘Lanta! Oh, gosh. Oh, gross.”

The video showed the body, and the couple said it appeared to have deteriorated. The person was wearing jeans, but the gender was not apparent.

Someone off-screen said to the couple, “Hey, no pictures. This is a crime scene.”

Then the video ended.

The couple went live a second time after finding the body, and they appeared to be discussing what they’ll do with the reward money. Authorities had offered a $35,000 reward for information that led to Couch’s arrest, and police confirmed Wednesday night the McCoys will receive $25,000 of that reward.

Fred and Sheila say they are descendants of the famous feuding families the Hatfields and McCoys from West Virginia and Kentucky.

The couple previously operated the Hatfields and McCoys museum in Casey County, according to the museum’s website. Casey County is about an hour west of the I-75 shootings.

Though the museum is closed indefinitely, the couple still operates a YouTube channel with more than 5,000 subscribers. Before the shooting, they posted mostly about the two families, but for several days they’ve posted about searching for Couch in the woods of north Laurel County.

They called themselves “bounty hunters on the hunt,” and they told WKYT they decided to start searching for Couch as a “date night” idea.

Fred McCoy is a retired police officer, according to the museum website.

While on the run, Couch was charged with five counts of attempted murder and five counts of first-degree assault. There were no fatalities in the shooting.

Couch sent texts to a woman before the shooting, saying “I’m going to kill a lot of people,” adding, “Well (I’m going to) try at least,” according to court documents.

He told the woman he planned to kill himself afterward. Police later found his Toyota parked atop a hill on a U.S. Forest Service Road near Exit 49, where the shooting happened, and they found the AR-15 they think he used in the shooting.

This is a breaking story and will be updated.

This story will be updated.

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