STERLING HEIGHTS, Mich. – The Sterling Heights Police Department has rescued an 80-year-old man with dementia.
The rescue occurred on Wednesday (July 17) in the 34126 block of Colonial Drive, where Thomas walked away from his home.
Thomas’ wife, Delores, told officials she was worried about her husband.
“We’ve been together a long time,” said Thomas.
She advised officers that she had woken up to him missing from the home, and he had a history of walking away from the house and getting lost.
Officials say Delores checked her Ring doorbell and found that Thomas had walked out of the front door at 6 a.m.
“So I just grabbed my car key, pajamas and all, and got in the car,” said Delores.
Delores told officials that Thomas has been declining worse mentally, causing the family to place a tracker on him at all times.
Delores provided officers with her phone and the tracker app, which showed Thomas in the woods south of the BAE Systems (34201 Van Dyke Avenue) property.
The tracker app showed Thomas between Mound Road and Van Dyke Avenue, which has many acres of heavily wooded property.
While attempting to check for further location updates on the tracker, officials discovered that Thomas’ GPS tracker had died and could not update its location.
“The tracker only had 10 minutes on it, and it expired, but if it hadn’t been for the tracker, none of us would’ve looked back there,” Delores said.
Officers said they searched the areas surrounding the large wooded area and could not locate Thomas.
Officials deployed a drone to locate Thomas alongside a K9 officer and K9 Chip.
Officers said they located a small driveway that appeared to go into the woods about a half mile west of Van Dyke Avenue and stopped at the woods and the rear of the BAE property.
After about an hour and a half, Thomas was located approximately three-quarters of a mile west of Van Dyke Avenue in the woods by K9 Chip.
Officials say Thomas was lost and confused about where he was and had to be assisted to escape the heavily wooded area.
Thomas was observed to be bleeding from a few cuts to his hands, so medical care was provided by the Sterling Heights Fire Department before he was safely turned over to Delores and their son.
“I took the biggest sigh,” Delores said. “It was like relief. By the time he got home he said he doesn’t remember it. All he could say is that he met a nice dog. The police dog kept coming to him and rubbing against him, trying to get him to follow it. That’s all he remembers was the nice dog.”