The body of a teenager who disappeared on Saturday after calling his mother and telling her, “Someone is trying to kill me,” has been found and identified in rural Alabama.
Authorities discovered the body of 19-year-old Nick Hawkins wrapped in a covering in an "illegal dump site" in Walker County on Tuesday evening, AL.com reported. He was formally identified by authorities on Wednesday.
"Our thoughts and prayers are with the Hawkins family during this horrible tragedy," police in the city of Dora said on Facebook.
On Saturday evening, Hawkins texted his grandmother around 7:30 p.m. local time to tell her he was heading home after attending a beauty pageant, but half an hour later called his mother to say someone was trying to kill him, WVTM13 reported.
The call cut out, however, and Hawkins provided no information why he believed his life was in danger, the Daily Mountain Eagle newspaper reported.
"When the family last spoke to him he stated someone was trying to harm him," police said in a statement on Sunday.
Dora police did not immediately return a request for comment.
After Hawkins' car was discovered Sunday, authorities on Tuesday arrested Joshua Adam Reese, 21, on an outstanding warrant on a separate matter, but described him as a person of interest in the teen's disappearance.
"Nick Hawkins did name Joshua Adam Reese in the phone call to his mom, saying he was trying to kill him," Dora Police Chief Jared Hall told WVTM13 on Tuesday.
AL.com reported Reese is awaiting trial on an unrelated attempted murder charge.
Friends of Hawkins told BuzzFeed News the teenager came out as bisexual while in high school. "He didn't care who knew," Sydney Rhodes, 18, said. "He would do my make up every single time I went to his house."
"He was so fun and outgoing," Rhodes said. "He was always there if you needed him."
"It feels like a bad dream," 18-year-old Candace Reeves, another old friend of Hawkins', told BuzzFeed News. "I never thought something like this would happen to him. He never hurt anybody."