Four elderly members of a family from upstate New York, who embarked on a religious pilgrimage, were found deceased near their vehicle in West Virginia, according to police reports on Saturday. The family members, identified as Dr. Kishore Divan, 89, Asha Divan, 85, Shailesh Divan, 86, and Gita Divan, 84, had set out from Buffalo for the Palace of Gold, a renowned Hindu site in Marshall County, West Virginia. Their disappearance was reported on Tuesday.
The bodies were discovered next to their damaged Toyota Camry on Big Wheeling Creek Road on Saturday, as per a statement from the Marshall County Sheriff’s Office. Sheriff Mike Dougherty stated that the bodies were found on a steep embankment around 9:30 p.m. He added that first responders were at the scene for over five hours and extended his condolences to the victims’ families.
The group was last spotted around 2:45 p.m. on Tuesday when a Pennsylvania state trooper detected their license plate on I-79, according to WTOL-TV News. The exact familial relationship among the four, all of Indian descent, remains unclear.
The Hindustan Times reported that the family had reserved a room at the Palace of Gold retreat for Tuesday night but never arrived. Their last known stop was at a Burger King in Pennsylvania.
The Palace of Gold in Moundsville was constructed in the 1970s by followers of Srila Prabhupada, a spiritual leader from India who propagated the teachings of Hare Krishna before his death in 1977. The site continues to be a significant Hindu retreat.