Hikers have found human remains in a southern California mountain area where the British actor Julian Sands disappeared five months ago, authorities said.
The body was discovered at about 10am on Saturday in wilderness near Mount Baldy in the San Gabriel mountains and was transported to the coroner’s office for identification next week, the San Bernardino county sheriff’s department said in a statement.
The hikers contacted the Fontana sheriff’s station after they discovered human remains about 40 miles (65km) from the 65-year-old actor’s north Hollywood home in Los Angeles. Additional details were not immediately available.
Sands, an avid hiker and mountaineer best known for his roles in A Room with a View, The Killing Fields and Boxing Helena, was reported missing on 13 January after setting out on the peak that rises more than 10,000ft (3,000 metres) east of Los Angeles. The region was pounded by severe storms during winter, turning snow to ice, and two other hikers fell and died of their injuries between Christmas and late January. After Sands went missing, the authorities warned climbers they should be trained in alpine conditions and carry ice axes and crampons. “If you don’t know, don’t go,” they said.
Sixteen searches have been launched since January, during which time more than 500 hours have been spent looking for Sands, who was close friends with fellow actor John Malkovich. Malkovich described Sands as an “inveterate mountain climber/hiker” who was “was always tramping off to Kilimanjaro, or Antarctica, or the Andes, or the Alps”. He also climbed in Greenland and Asia.
On Friday, his family released its first statement since Sands’ disappearance. “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,” the statement said.
Last weekend the county sheriff’s department mustered 80 search and rescue volunteers, deputies and staff to continue looking for Sands, with the support of two helicopters and drone crews for areas inaccessible to ground crews. Some areas include steep terrain and ravines that still have more than 10 feet of ice and snow.
The fresh search revealed no trace and the sheriff’s office said efforts would continue but “in a limited capacity”.
Sands is married to the journalist Evgenia Citkowitz and has three adult children. Within weeks of Sands going missing, his brother, Nick Sands, a financial adviser who lives and works in Gargrave, the North Yorkshire town where they grew up, said: “I know in my heart that he has gone. However, sibling rivalry being what it is, it would be just like him to walk out of there and prove me wrong.”
