Definitely not a Pokémon: girl finds a dead body while playing Pokémon GO

Well that escalated quickly. A 19-year old girl has made a rather grisly discovery while hunting for Pokémon near a waterway in her city of Riverton, Wyoming. Shayla Wiggins jumped a fence to chase a Pokémon near the Wind River but, to her shock, discovered the corpse of a dead man floating in the water instead.

Wiggins promptly called 911 who said the man’s body had been in the water for less than 24 hours. Wiggins later said “I was pretty scared and cried for a while”. Police later reported the man’s death appeared to be an accidental drowning. A part of me kind of expected a death involving Pokémon GO to occur sooner or later – after all, wandering the streets with your face buried in your phone leads to accidents all the time.

But this is a twist on the story I wasn’t expecting: I mean, what are the chances of a Pokémon appearing at the exact same spot as a floating corpse? The only way this story could get any more bizarre is if the man fell into the water while chasing Pokémon himself.

Considering the immense popularity of Pokémon GO – so much so that its developer Niantic Labs has delayed its global rollout to cope with immense server pressure – more bizarre stories like this are bound to crop up. Pokémon GO rocketed to the top of the U.S. iOS app revenue charts in half a day after its release on June 6.

Up next: Square Enix pokes fun at the naming of Pokémon GO