Five Librarians Find Missing Elderly Man
“We immediately realized this man matched the missing person description. Together, the five of us mobilized.”
On a Friday early in May, five librarians from Staten Island — Krystina, Mleeka, Katelynne, Cherryl, and Olisha — were visiting Manhattan to attend the 16th Annual Young Child Expo & Conference at the Wyndham New Yorker Hotel, for workshops on new strategies in children’s communication to bring back to their hometown branches. After a keynote from Stedman Graham and a few presentations, it was time for lunch.
During the break, Olisha’s phone vibrated with a Citizen alert: ‘Search for Missing Elderly Man at W 27th St & 10th Ave’
From that alert, she opened Citizen to find a detailed description of the missing man — 79 years old, wearing a long-sleeve maroon shirt, black jacket, and unable to speak English.
As Olisha and her colleagues were in the midst of the conference, there was nothing they could do beyond hope that someone, somewhere might find him.
90 minutes later, as they were leaving the Wyndham, Cherryl noticed what appeared to be a disoriented-looking man walking through oncoming traffic right across the street.
Olisha recognized that this man exactly matched the Citizen description she had read earlier.
Mleeka pulled out her phone to open the app just to confirm. It was him.
“We immediately realized this man matched the missing person description,” said Katelynne, recalling the event. “Together, the five of us mobilized to approach the man and get him onto the sidewalk.”
Because of the information found in that Citizen notification, this man was no longer a complete stranger, but someone they recognized and knew they could actually help.
Krystina said that the five of them “worked together that day to try to make sure that he was safely brought to authorities, as he was wandering and at times walking in the street with quick-moving traffic.”
Katelynne added, “He did not speak much English and was described on the app, I believe, as having dementia, which was clear upon interaction. He did not know where he was and wanted a taxi, but did not have an address to give the taxi. He wanted to keep moving, so we worked together to convince him to walk with us until we could reach EMS.”
“We approached him in hopes of receiving any relevant details and guidance towards the police officers because of the language barrier,” said Mleeka.
Using a mixture of hand signals, Google Translate, and what they recalled from high school French class, they were able to generally coordinate with the man and get him moving towards help.
The group of five escorted him around the streets of NYC for more than 20 minutes until they found a group of police officers in Herald Square that could help him.
“We finally saw police officers and informed them about the Citizen notification. At around 4:50–4:55pm, he was in the police officer’s custody on 34th and Broadway,” Mleeka said.
Citizen is designed to keep people safe and informed.
These five incredible librarians are our Citizen heroes.
Citizen instantly sends safety alerts directly to your phone whenever significant crime or emergencies happen near you.
