A California man who has been missing since 1999 has been found alive 25 years later after his sister never stopped searching for him.
The man, whose name has only been listed as 'Tommy' for privacy reasons, had been reported missing in 1999 from Doyle, California, and was found over 500 miles away in a Los Angeles county hospital over the weekend, the Lassen County Sheriff’s Office said on Monday.
Despite there having been no trace of him in the past two and a half decades, he was miraculously found alive after being taken into the hospital.
His sister had been sent a USA Today article seeking information about an unidentified man who was nonverbal, who had been at the St. Francis Medical Center in Lynwood for over a month after being found in South LA, according to the sheriff’s office.
After seeing the article, she reached out as she believed that the man in the photograph was her missing brother, sparking the Lassen County Sheriff to investigate.
Sheriff’s Deputy Derek Kennemore had reached out to the hospital but was told by staff that the man had been transferred to a different Los Angeles area hospital in July.
When Kennenmore called the second hospital, they confirmed that they had a nonverbal patient in their care whose identity was unknown, who matched the description of the woman's missing brother.
The Los Angeles police and missing persons unit was notified and they joined the investigation to try and establish his identity.
The unknown man was visited by an LAPD detective who fingerprinted him and found his prints were a positive match for the man who'd vanished from Doyle in 1999.
After the match was established, Kennemore called the man's sister and gave her the news she'd been waiting to hear for 25 years - that her brother had been found safe and alive.
She is now soon to be reunited with her long-lost brother, the sheriff's office said.
The Nor-Cal Alliance for the Missing called it "a long-awaited and miraculous reunion".
It said in a press release: "Tommy’s return proves that miracles can happen. To Tommy’s family, your courage and perseverance inspire us all. Today, we celebrate a reunion 25 years in the making - a moment that brings light to the darkest of times."
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