On a day when most families celebrate Christmas, a Minnesota family spent all day in the freezing cold looking for their missing family member. 

A young Minnesota resident was reported missing on Christmas Eve after he was last seen leaving a bar without a winter coat. George Musser, 20, was found dead by authorities in Baytown Township on Sunday, Christmas Day, at around 7 pm. 

Musser was a student at the University of Wisconsin-River Falls.

On a Facebook post, Musser’s cousin, Emily Dalbec, confirmed the tragic news. She wrote, “I’m heartbroken to share that police have found his body.”

Musser was last seen at Brian’s Bar and Grill in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area on Christmas Eve before disappearing.

One of the last bar customers to speak to him, Ally MacKay, said she saw him at around 1:30 am.

“He came over to the booth where I was sitting with my friends and he talked to us,” she recollected. “And he told us he had to visit the washroom and he never returned back.”

Musser’s car keys and wallet were recovered near the bar while his car remained in the parking lot. The weather was -2 degrees, but the 20-year-old walked out of the bar wearing jeans, a gray flannel top, and a black beanie.

When the bar was about to be closed, a search was launched by family members to find Musser, but the bar attendants insisted they leave, so they left the area and assumed he had probably found his way home. 

Sunday morning, family and friends launched a massive search hunt for the young man. The search involved more than 100 volunteers who spent the entire day searching for the missing man in the freezing cold. Dalbec, Musser’s cousin, said that the family prepared for the worst but hoped for the best as they engaged the community to help in the search.

Stillwater police on Sunday confirmed they had notified Musser’s family about finding his body. The investigation is still ongoing and it’s still unclear whether his death was a homicide. The department is yet to divulge any further information surrounding the young man’s death.

According to Stillwater chief of Police Brian Mueller, the department has had trouble checking the electronic surveillance.

Following the discovery of his body, Heidi Kram, Musser’s other cousin, set up a GoFundMe campaign which had already collected close to $38000 in donations by late Monday afternoon.