Elliott Eastman, the American YouTuber shot during abduction, may have died from gunshot wounds, Philippine police say.

Manila, Philippines — Philippine police officials said Thursday they were investigating reports that a hostage-taker died after being shot twice while resisting an Oct. 17 kidnapping by gunmen in the southern US country. Eliot EastmanThe 26-year-old from Vermont was shot twice with an M16 rifle as he tried to fight off his four captors, who were posing as police officers, in coastal Zamboanga del Norte province, police said. in the town of Sebuku, police said.

According to initial police reports, the kidnappers dragged him onto a motorboat and sped away.

A massive manhunt for Eastman and his captors led to the arrest of several suspects, but they were never found. Three suspects were killed in armed clashes with police in the south last month.

Regional police spokesman Lt. Col. Ramoncilio Savon said investigators received a tip from a relative of one of the suspects that Eastman died of gunshot wounds to the thigh and abdomen while being taken away by the kidnappers. The relative said that the kidnappers decided to throw her body into the sea after her death.

Information about Eastman’s death was later confirmed by a key suspect in the kidnapping who was recently arrested, and whose sworn statement has been submitted to state prosecutors, Sawan said. He said that criminal complaints of kidnapping have been filed against several suspects.

“We are forced to believe that he is dead. All the information we have points to him,” Sawan said. But he added that without the victim’s body, “we’re still holding out a little bit of hope that it might not be” and that police would continue their investigation.

Philippine police have notified Eastman’s Filipino wife and the U.S. Embassy in Manila of his death, Sawan said.

The embassy said it was aware of the police report and was liaising with Philippine authorities, but did not comment further due to privacy concerns.

Eastman traveled out of the Philippines and returned to Cebu to attend his wife’s graduation when he was kidnapped. Police had previously said he had been posting YouTube and Facebook videos of his life in the poor, remote coastal town of Sibuco, where the suspects spotted him.

He said the suspects appeared to be common criminals who did not belong to any Muslim rebel groups that have been accused of kidnapping for ransom in the past.

Security issues have long dogged the southern Philippines, home to a Muslim minority in the largely Roman Catholic nation.

The southern third of the Philippines has enormous resources but has long been plagued by poverty, insurgency and illegal immigration.

On his YouTube page, Eastman said he came to the Philippines and met “the love of my life deep in the mountains” of Zamboanga del Norte, which he said offered followers a glimpse of “everyday life.” Will find to do. The first and only foreigner to take up permanent residence in a remote area.

A 2014 peace deal between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the largest of several Muslim separatist groups, has significantly reduced widespread fighting in the south. Continued military operations have weakened smaller armed groups such as the Abu Sayyaf, reducing kidnappings, bombings and other violence.

Abu Sayyaf has targeted Americans and other Western tourists and missionaries, many of whom were released after ransoms were paid. A few were killed, including American Guillermo Sobero, who was beheaded on the southern island of Basilan, and Martin Burnham, an American missionary who died in 2002 when the Philippine military tried to rescue him and his wife, Gracia Burnham. was doing A rainforest near Sibuco.