I solved a 27 year cold case, found my lost uncle.

My Uncle Dick is only 5 years older then me, and growing up in the late 1950s and early 60s, he was more like an older brother. He had a hot rod and was like Fonzie to me. Sadly, Dick developed Paranoid Schizophrenia in the late 1970s and became aggressive at times and didn’t trust anyone.

Everything was a conspiracy to him. He was in hospitals a couple of times but would not take the medicine or stay long. Our aunt divorced him and he had to be forcibly removed from the home by the sheriff. He was staying near my dad at a room dad got for him in 1990. But he got evicted for working on cars in his room (there was talk of a welding fire!). He took his inheritance from grandma out of the joint bank account my dad had opened for him, loaded up his car and drove off. No one ever saw him again. Until Friday. My dad spent a lot of his later years looking for his little brother. Most of us figured he ended up as a John Doe somewhere.

Dick’s two brothers have now both passed away, first my other uncle in 2013 and my dad in 2015. We even put a notice in dad’s obituary that his brother is “Whereabouts unknown”. The funeral eventually got all of us cousins back together through Facebook and email. All along I thought Dick’s four girls might know something, but the first thing the youngest asked when we got in touch was, “Do you know where my dad is?”

I had recently searched a bunch of area county’s court records to see if anything showed up, but found nothing. So I wrote up all the information I had and took it and a photo to the county sheriff to see if I could get them interested. As expected, they considered it a case of an adult who simply does not want to be contacted. His name is very common, but a search for combined name and birthday showed he did not have a current driver’s license, and the last activity on the expired license was a ticket from 1992 in a county across the state. That was more then I had before.

When I got home I immediately searched the court records for that county. There are 4 courts listed. The first two were city courts and had nothing. The third was the county civil/criminal court and had some more citations from the 1990s and early 2000s but no address and he was a no-show for the court dates. In fact when I opened his case files I triggered an outstanding warrant alert. Getting closer!

Finally the county Probate Court had a lengthy case file on someone with his name and birth date. He had been found homeless, living under a bridge and had frostbite on one foot. The court immediately declared him a ward of the state and he has been in an assisted living and rehab center for 3 years. Their notices searching for family turned up nothing, and Dick never told them anything.

Yesterday my sister and I drove to the nursing home to check it out. It is indeed our missing Uncle Dick, now 76 years old. I would never have recognized him with the large grey beard. It took awhile before he even believed we were who we claimed to be, and awhile before we were sure. But eventually he remembered his four daughters and all us cousins. I got him talking about cars, we had both raced Fords and that greatly pleased him. We had noticed in the case files that he had a $10 monthly allowance for Pepsi so we took a 12 pack and he was delighted.

The sad note to all this is that as I was going through my dad’s papers my sister had, and we realized dad had been using the wrong birthday for his searches, he was off by a year. He might at least been able to find out Dick was in that area long before before he passed away.

The staff said his paranoia shows, but he has been calm with no sign of aggression. We are treading lightly. I asked him if it was OK if we came back, and he was unsure. We won’t push him, but there are a dozen people who are all glad Dick has been found alive.

Dennis

You totally fucking rock, mixdenny!

I hope that this brings some measure of happiness and/or peace to you and your family. You done good.

:slight_smile:

Glad your story had a happy ending.

Certainly not a mundane story…thanks for sharing.

Good story.

We fully expect my younger brother to die as a John Doe somewhere on the streets of Salt Lake City some winter night.

People who won’t or can’t stay with a program to treat their mental illness can be very difficult to deal with.

It hurts my mother so much, but there isn’t anything we can do with him. We tried and tried and tried. Mental illness is a bitch.

I hope this gives his children some peace of mind.

Whatever happens mixdenny, you’ve done the right thing!

:slight_smile:

What a sad and wonderful story. Did you talk to Dicks sisters afterwards? How did they feel about it?

Great read! From his daughters’ perspectives, I can’t imagine what it’s like to have a parent go that far off the rails.

We sent out a text on the way home and I called his youngest daughter, she is the one we are in contact with. She is overwhelmed with relief. According to her, the two oldest daughters (who were adopted from a previous marriage) weren’t interested in seeing him, but at least glad to know he didn’t die alone somewhere. They all left home as soon as they found boyfriends back when, just to get away from the terrible home life. The youngest left home at only 15.

Nobody really lives close except me and my sister. Hopefully Dick will like an occasional visit and we can keep him up to date with things. He wouldn’t allow phones or cameras, didn’t trust them.

Dennis

Well done!

What a wonderful story! Thanks for sharing it!

Good on you for sticking with it. I’m sure, in his own way, he’ll be happy to have someone in his life again. You’ve done a wonderful service for his kids!

I’m glad you found your uncle, and that he is in a safe place.

My wife’s uncle’s body was never found after he was washed away in a flash flood in the Tehachapi/Rosamond area in October, 2015. (They searched while water still covered the area, then gave up.) It would be nice if a cadaver dog team would have an exercise there.

Is your story in the news yet? It should be, if not.

Congratulations. Glad you found him. He’ll have family nearby at the end of his life. Good for you. :slight_smile:

Congrats. Glad it had an ending. Well done.

That is so awesome :slight_smile: I’m so glad that you were able to find him instead of merely finding out what happened to him after he died. I have an uncle that disappeared into Canada in 1979, but it was to avoid the cops, not due to mental illness. Maybe he’ll turn up yet.