West Chester University students crowd the steps in front of the Sykes Student Union Center in West Chester, Pa., on Dec. 3, 2014, during a candlelight vigil for fellow student Shane Montgomery who went missing early Thanksgiving morning after leaving a bar in Manayunk.(Photo: Clem Murray, AP)
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The body of a West Chester University student who disappeared on Thanksgiving after a night out with friends was recovered Saturday from the Schuylkill River, less than half a mile downstream from where he was last seen.
Shane Montgomery's parents say the body pulled from the water Saturday was his. Authorities had not yet confirmed the identity pending a review by the Philadelphia medical examiner's office.
WCAU-TV reports that his family watched a search crew remove the 21-year-old's body from the water.
"Today we have done what we promised. We found and brought Shane home," Karen Montgomery, Shane's mother, said in a statement posted online, thanking everyone involved in the search and asking that the family's privacy be respected as they mourned their loss.
Shane, a senior at West Chester, had been out with friends until the early-morning hours of Thanksgiving and never made it home. His mother has said he was escorted out of Kildare's Irish Pub in the city's lively Manayunk neighborhood around 2 a.m.
FBI Supervisory Special Agent J.J. Klaver said Saturday a body was recovered behind the Manayunk Brew Pub, less than a 10-minute walk from Kildare's.
In addition to city police and the FBI, hundreds of volunteers helped search for Montgomery and posted fliers about his disappearance. A candlelight vigil drew a large crowd to the university's student union building in early December, and contributions from the family, police and Kildare's pushed the reward fund to $65,000.
Divers found Montgomery's keys along the river on Dec. 21.
His mother spoke of the family's frustration last month at a candlelight vigil.
"The frustrating part is that there are no leads — no one knows what happened to him," Karen Montgomery said. "It's a nightmare I can't wake up from."
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