Police still don’t know how a Juneau man with autism ended up spending Wednesday night alone in the cold, half a mile from where he was last seen, but they aren’t pressing him for answers right now.
He’s safe, and that’s all that matters, police said.
“He just seemed a little overwhelmed by the attention,” Juneau Police Department spokesman Lt. David Campbell said Thursday.
A pair of hikers found Ryan Harvey, 22, along the John Muir Trail as an extensive search was underway on and around the University of Alaska Southeast campus.
“There’s still a lot of unanswered questions but the important thing is he’s safe and he’s home,” Campbell said. “We can find that other stuff out later.”
Around 10 p.m. Wednesday night, the Juneau Police Department sent out a missing person alert via Facebook, asking the community to help them locate Harvey, who was last seen around 2:10 p.m. Wednesday leaving the UAS library. He had left his cellphone and his coat behind. Campbell said Harvey’s family called the police later that day when they didn’t hear from him, prompting an immediate missing “vulnerable” person search of the area.
Around noon Thursday, almost 24 hours after Harvey went missing, two local hikers not part of the search party saw Harvey on the John Muir Trail, Campbell said. The two women recognized him from fliers and other social media announcements, and they were able to convince Harvey — who isn’t very communicative because of his autism — that he should get in their car and out of the cold. The women took Harvey to a JPD Community Services Officer in the Auke Lake parking lot for help.
A group of volunteers who were seeking shelter from the rain under the JPD Mobile Command Center’s tent and gearing up for another search of the area heard the good news around 12:35 p.m. from JPD officer Jeff Brink.
“He’s cold and wet, but he is in good hands,” Brink said.
The group of 10 people erupted in cheers, all smiling with looks of relief on their faces that Harvey was safe.
Harvey went by the command center where the search for him had carried on throughout the night to briefly hang out with some of the officers and volunteers who looked for him, Campbell said. He enjoyed a slice of pizza and borrowed a warm sweater from a friend. Then he told his mom he just wanted to go home.
Campbell said Harvey didn’t require any medical attention.
“Our hope was to get an interview with him and gain some more understanding of what was going on … but we figured we’ll let him go home with mom,” Campbell said.
UAS spokesperson Keni Campbell told the Empire that Harvey is not a current university student, but he has taken classes in the past and he frequently hangs out at the campus because it’s a place he feels “comfortable.”
A university-wide email was sent out by Michael Ciri, UAS vice chancellor for administration, Wednesday morning encouraging everyone on campus to take part in “periodic sweeps of campus buildings around the Auke Lake area” to help locate Harvey.
The university also set up a web tool to help those searching mark off area of the campus that were searched and when they were searched, to make sure efforts weren’t being duplicated.
Tiff Johnson, one of the volunteers at the JPD command center when the news of Harvey’s recovery was announced, said she had just showed up 30 minutes earlier and didn’t get to actually search because “good news came fast and it was amazing to witness the good news.”
“I am a mother myself and the thought of my child missing just chills me to the bone,” Johnson said. “I wanted to help in any way that I could.”
Johnson said she learned about the search from JPD’s Facebook post, which was shared over 900 times with several people also commenting that they left their homes late Wednesday night to help with the search.
“(I’m) very grateful he was found unharmed and (is) with his mom where he belongs,” Johnson said.
Second search
Coincidentally, there is another search going on for a second missing person in Juneau.
Roughly 10 hours before alerting the public about Harvey being missing, Juneau police announced early Wednesday morning that Christopher Edward Orcutt, also 22, hasn’t been seen since the night of Aug. 25.
JPD said Orcutt, who is homeless, went missing after he left a party at an apartment over a downtown store. Orcutt had left the party intoxicated and forgot several of his clothing layers and his cellphone, police said.
[Juneau police search for missing homeless man, last seen leaving downtown party]
A relative of Orcutt’s who stores most of his belongings at his home said Orcutt has not stopped by since Aug. 25.
Police confirmed that Orcutt did not take a ferry or flight out of town.
Anyone with information about Orcutt’s whereabouts can call JPD at 586-0600. A photo of Orcutt can be found at the Juneau Police Department’s FB page or at juneauempire.com.
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Juneau Police Department handout of Ryan Harvey.
Juneau Police Department Officer Jeff Brink, second from right, gives volunteer searchers direction in the search for Ryan Harvey, 22, at the University of Alaska Southeast on Thursday.
