A missing 14-year-old boy is feared to be in “extreme danger” after he vanished in Indiana and was allegedly last seen wearing a shirt with strange writing on it.
Scottie Dean Morris hasn’t been seen since around 8.30pm Thursday (16 March) when he was spotted in Eaton, a small town of about 1,600 people northeast of Indianapolis.
The alert states that the teen is “5 foot 4 inch tall, 150 pounds,” has “brown hair with blue eyes,” and that he was “last seen wearing black shoes, red and black shorts and a white T-shirt with writing on the front”.
“He is believed to be in extreme danger and may require medical assistance,” the Indiana Clearinghouse for Information on Missing Children and Missing Endangered Adults said in its alert.
A photo shared by Indiana State Police showed a visibly upset Scottie wearing a shirt with words written in black marker. The top reads: “I’m a liar” with a crying face. Other visible words are “hurt” and “cheat”, underlined.
The Eaton Indiana Police Department began its search on Thursday night and issued a missing person alert the following morning.
On Friday, the local police department wrote on Facebook that “we currently have over 100 volunteers out searching for Scotty Morris, which is so amazing and we are very grateful!”
They added that they had two boats in a rover in the area and were also using two infrared drones, in addition to two bloodhound units having been sent in from Grant County.
On Sunday, the department said they would not be organising a search party “because we will have helicopters from the Indiana State Police using their infrared cameras. We ask that if you continue to search on your own today, please refrain from wooded areas, tree lines, rivers, etc as this will only hinder the investigation while they’re in the air searching”.
Later on Sunday, the police said a regular search on foot would resume at 9am on Monday morning and asked volunteers to meet at the police station.
On several occasions, police addressed Scottie in their social media posts.
“Scottie, if you see this, please know we are doing everything we can do to get whatever help you may need & to make sure you are safe and warm,” the police said.
When Scottie was last spotted, he was walking east on Indiana Avenue, close to Mar Fran Court in Eaton, according to WTHR.
The local police chief Jay Turner said on Saturday it was “all hands on deck” and residents in the area came and joined the search efforts.
“What they did today was very tremendous,” Mr Turner told WTHR. “They went out into a thick wood line area next to a river, both sides of the river, and walked somewhat of a line completely for two and a half miles.”
Four searches of the town have been conducted so far.
“We are a small department,” the chief said. “We have four regular officers and 18 reserves. Our reserves and our regulars volunteered their time to come in and do these searches. I’m very pleased how we came together — fire department, EMS, police department.”
Police said finding him soon is vital as temperatures plummet.
“I want this young man to know we are not here to make sure he’s in trouble. We want to help him and make sure he’s safe,” Mr Turner said.
“We’ve taken this seriously from the very beginning, and we’re going to continue to investigate until we find him,” he added.
