Photo By Petty Officer 3rd Class seth coulter | Officer Webb reenacts duties. read more read more
COLUMBUS, Ohio – Defense Supply Center Columbus police responded to a call at the front gates during lunch on Jan. 18. A man was walking onto the installation trying to get to his father’s house. Officer Lee Ranzey and Ryan Sutphin were the first on site and realized right away that this was not a normal situation. Officer Jerry Pyle was second on scene and said, “The only information he could tell us was his age, 70. He couldn’t tell us his birthday, where he was from or anything else.”
The officers were able to obtain the man’s driver license and ran it through the database system. That is when Pyle confirmed the suspension about this being an unusual stop. The terminal provided an alert for a missing person.
The man’s family had reported him missing from Massillon, Ohio roughly 48 hours prior and noted he suffers from dementia, high blood pressure and early onset Alzheimer’s disease. He had also been without his medication for approximately 36 hours. Dispatch notified the family and they immediately left to reunite with the man.
24-hours prior, police discovered his vehicle on Interstate 670. The man had ran out of gas, grabbed his gas can and started walking. He was wandering around Whitehall for almost a day before he showed at the DSCC gates.
“We think he was originally from the area as he mentioned many times that he wanted to go to his dad’s house and pointed to the other side of the installation,” said Pyle.
The man was nervous and confused. “This is a hard situation; the person didn’t really know what was going on. He made several comments saying ‘I didn’t do anything wrong,’” said Pyle. Lt. Harry Salcone said, “The officer’s training was able to kick in and help.” The responding officer, Webb, recognized the lights and sirens were causing unnecessary agitation. Pyle said, “Webb took action and turned off the overheads – reds and blues - which calmed the man’s mind and the situation almost immediately.”
Officer Marco Schmigotzki arrived as the Whitehall police placed the man into the vehicle to prepare to transport him to a safe space in Whitehall to await his family’s arrival. He said that “it isn’t often we get to see a positive thing happen. The reward of the gentleman being reunited with family was great.” Lt. Salcone added, “It was such a great thing to be involved with something so positive.”
Salcone also spoke on the officers’ actions, “When you look at the totality of what happened there – this is what I would call excellence in action. These officers and sergeants that responded to an unknown situation, making an evaluation and bringing to a logical conclusion was what they train for, but to see it implemented and resulting in a positive outcome is what this job is about. It is an incredible thing that doesn’t happen all the time.”
| Date Taken: | 01.24.2017 |
| Date Posted: | 02.05.2018 12:51 |
| Story ID: | 264690 |
| Location: | COLUMBUS, OH, US |
| Web Views: | 69 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, DSCC police reunite missing man with family, by Dana Thornbury, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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