Missing autistic California teen found safe in Utah after 3 years

PARK CITY, Utah — An autistic teenager who went missing three years ago in California has been found in Utah, authorities said.

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Connerjack Oswalt was 16 when he was reported missing from Clear Lake, California, on Sept. 29, 2019, KSTU-TV reported.

“We’ve had a lot of false hope over the last two and a half years,” Gerald Flint, the teen’s stepfather, told the television station.

The Summit County Sheriff’s Office was alerted several weeks ago about a man pushing a shopping cart and sleeping in the cold outside Jeremy’s Store, a convenience store by a gas station in Park City, SFGate.com reported.

Body camera footage shared by CBS News showed officers approaching Oswalt in front of the store and offering him a seat in the police car to warm up.

Officers had checked on the man but never learned his name, according to KSTU.

“As we’ve dealt with this individual he has never been aggressive towards law enforcement but he’s been resistant towards law enforcement,” Sheriff Justin Martinez, of the Summit County Sheriff’s Office, told the television station.

The man consented to a finger scan, and it came back with a warrant out of Nevada for a man named Connerjack Oswald, according to KSTU.

Deputies, believing there was “more to the story,” began researching databases.

Dispatchers began combing through the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children database.

“After about 16 pages of scouring through names and photographs and trying to find something that might match up, came up with the name, Connerjack Oswalt,” Martinez told reporters.

Oswalt’s family had moved from California to Idaho since his disappearance, SFGate.com reported. The family was forced to move because of wildfires that damaged their home, KSTU reported.

“We searched all over California, we had the missing centers of America, we had the Polly Klaas Foundation and the DOJ,” Oswalt’s mother, Suzanne, told SFGate.com.

The spelling of Oswalt’s last name was different in both research methods. But once deputies believed they had a positive match, they contacted his stepfather, who drove to Utah to verify his identity.

“Honestly, I’m still dumbstruck by the situation,” Flint told KSTU. “To find him alive is incredible.”

“We’re just grateful that he’s safe and he’s alive and we have our son back. That’s the most important thing ever for us,” Oswalt’s mother told the television station.

Oswalt is now safe in a treatment facility, according to KSTU.

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