We recently received a call from the father of a teenage son, Peter (not his real name). Peter hadn’t been heard from in over 48 hours, and his father was anxious so he called us to help find him.
Peter was 18 years old and lived alone in Santa Monica, California. He had no relatives, girlfriend or friends the father could call upon to find his whereabouts. The young man’s father told us that he had tried calling Peter’s cell phone but it constantly went to voicemail. He was missing.
Within 48 hours, we found Peter through the use of our exclusive proprietary and sophisticated technology.
Peter was located just on the outskirts of San Diego, California, almost a two and a half hours drive from Santa Monica. San Diego is very close to the Mexican border and we were concerned that if he went into Mexico he might be kidnapped.
There was no way our investigators could make it to San Diego by plane or car in time to secure his location and start surveillance. We reached out to our associates in San Diego and explained the situation. We asked them to assign someone they trusted to commence an immediate surveillance of Peter.
One of their private investigators was sent on site within the hour and as we drove to San Diego, we were in constant contact with the private investigator. He maintained the surveillance for us until one of our investigators arrived. By the time we pulled into the parking lot of the motel where Peter was staying, he had just pulled into a space in front of one the guest rooms.
The only way to handle this situation smoothly was to simply walk up to Peter and identify ourselves. Since he was over eighteen years old, he was considered an adult so we could not force him to come with us. He had to want us to help him and he had to want to return home to his parents. We explained to Peter that we were retained to find him by his father and that we were not going to force him to go back to him. We further explained that he had the option to speak with us or not.
Peter was clearly shocked that we had found him. He was very depressed and lonely. We consoled him and explained to him how frightened his family was and how much they loved him and wanted to speak with him. He agreed to speak only with his sister at first, and then later on with his mother and father. While we maintained a twenty-four hour surveillance of him outside of his room, his mother flew out from Ft. Lee, Florida, the following day. When we asked Peter what he would like to do while we waited for his mother to arrive, he replied that he had planned on going to the San Diego Zoo. We accompanied him there and he had a wonderful time.
We established a rapport with Peter and in time, he revealed the reason why he had chosen to disappear. He had dropped out of college due to unsatisfactory grades and had not told his parents, who were supporting him thinking he was still enrolled in college. Peter felt guilty and unworthy, but he certainly was not. He was a fine young man who really needed then to be with his family back home. He departed San Diego with his mother in a far happier state than when we had located him.
You can reunite with your missing family member.