Sterling Heights police officers rescued an 80-year-old man with dementia who was lost in the woods for nearly 2 hours.
On July 17th, 2024 at 6:30 am, officers were dispatched to 34126 block of Colonial Dr. for a missing Person (Thomas).
Dispatch advised that Thomas was 80 years old and suffered from dementia and walked away from his address. The wife of the missing elderly man was scared and worried for her husband. She advised officers that she woke up to him missing from the home, and he had a history of walking away from the home and getting lost, police said. The wife then checked the ring doorbell, and found that he walked out of the front door at approximately 0600 hrs.
Delores stated that Thomas has been declining worse mentally as of recently. Due to this, she has a tracker on him at all times. Delores provided officers with her phone, and the tracker app showed Thomas in the woods South of the BAE Systems (34201 Van Dyke) property. Thomas was showing between Mound and Van Dyke, which has many acres of heavily wooded property, police said. While attempting to check for further location updates on the tracker, it was discovered that Thomas’s GPS tracker had gone dead, and was not able to update his location.
After about an hour and a half after being missing, and approximately three-quarters of a mile west of Van Dyke in the woods, K9 Chip’s track was successful, and Chip located Thomas.
“Thomas who was clearly lost and confused about where he was and had to be assisted by officers to get out of the heavily wooded area. Thomas was observed to be bleeding from a few cuts to his hands. Thomas was provided medical care by the fire department and safely turned over to his wife and son,” police said in a news release.
