KUALA LUMPUR – For Leanne Burnett, the last few days have been a waking nightmare. Her 25-year-old son, Jordan Johnson-Doyle, vanished while backpacking solo in Malaysia, and now she’s preparing to travel thousands of miles in a frantic attempt to find him.
Jordan, a remote-working software engineer from the UK, had been travelling across Southeast Asia for over a year. He arrived in Malaysia on May 17 after spending time in Vietnam. On the night of May 27, he was believed to have gone to a pub quiz at Healy Mac’s Irish Bar in Bangsar, Kuala Lumpur—his last known location.
“I’ve been feeling sick, numb. I just want to get over there, find him, and bring him home,” Burnett said, as quoted by Daily Mail.
The final sign of life came when he sent a photo of the pub’s quiz night poster to a friend. After that, silence. His phone went dead days later, last pinging near a residential block close to the bar. Attempts to reach him since have gone unanswered.
Burnett said her son was never one to go off the grid without notice.
“Something is really wrong for him not to contact anyone. He knows how worried we’d be,” she told the daily.
“He knows my number by heart. He would go to a hotel, an internet café—he’d find a way.”
Their last conversation took place on May 26, just a day before his disappearance.
“It was just a normal chat about our day. He seemed completely fine. We always end our calls with ‘love long time’—that was the last thing we said.”
With no new leads and communication lost, Burnett and her family have turned to authorities in both the UK and Malaysia, filing reports and alerting the British High Commission. But they are not waiting idly.
The family is now heading to Kuala Lumpur to begin their own search, battling not only the pain of uncertainty but also language barriers and the limitations of searching in a foreign country.
Despite the distance and the unknowns, Burnett is determined. “We’re doing everything we can. Please share anything—if you’ve seen him, heard from him, or noticed any activity online. We just want to find him and bring him home.”
Jordan’s loved ones have also mobilised online, sharing his photo and details on social media and local platforms, hoping someone might recognise him or provide a clue. For Burnett, every passing hour without word from her son deepens the fear.
“It’s a mother’s worst nightmare,” she said. – June 2, 2025