Dakota Patton, a 23-year-old from Parsons, Kansas had been missing for nearly two weeks.

“[For] 13 days, it was just like an open wound every day.” Patrick Patton, Dakota’s brother said. “Dakota was last seen alive at a gas station. My mom and I found his car dragged out to the middle of a field with two blown tires. No, no Dakota in it at all. We did a grid search of that whole mile section with volunteer firefighters and the sheriff’s [office], and there was no sign of Dakota.”

Patton’s body was found in rural Neosho County, Kansas.

“They finally found him yesterday over on 20th and Xavier, just a mile away from where we were searching,” Patton said.

Clint Nibarger and Kimberly Thomas were arrested and charged with First Degree Murder, nearly three and a half hours away at a home in Hollister.

“Once we got the phone call that the two people who, you know, did that to Dakota were arrested, that made us feel really good,” Patton said. “We’re really happy that they’re caught, and they’re charged now.”

Patton says Nibarger and his brother were on-and-off friends.

“My family had known him, he’d been riding horses with us for quite a few years,” Patton said. “He has just been recently started to come back around and Dakota was just starting to hang kind of hang out with him again.”

Patrick says he misses his brother.

“He loved animals. He loved riding horses and four-wheelers and fishing and camping,” Patton said. “He just loved being outside. He was just a, you know, fun-loving, outgoing person.”

The Patton Family tells KOLR 10 they’re grateful for the support online, whether on social media or a newly created GoFundMe or those who helped on foot.

“We’re thankful for all the support, especially on social media and everybody that, you know, people [who] have been out there searching with us and looking with us,” Patton said.