A relative of a missing Teulon, Man.-area man says she’s “holding out for a miracle” that her loved one will be found.
Lana Knor’s second cousin, 69-year-old Stewart Campbell, was last seen around 3:30 a.m. on July 15. He was reported missing by friends to Stonewall RCMP two days later.
On July 24, RCMP located his vehicle on Road 3 West, north of Highway 2, roughly seven kilometres east of Starbuck. Campbell was not with the vehicle.
“He pulled off here because he was out of gas,” Knor said. “He had his cat with him, and nobody knows where he is from there.”
Knor said Campbell, a lifelong Interlake cattle producer, suffers from rheumatoid arthritis, and friends had been trying to get him help after noticing changes in his behaviour.
“We assume he has dementia or something very wrong with memory loss,” she said.
“Every tip is looked into to see if we can get any leads, but as for now, we’re at a status quo,” said Manitoba RCMP Media Relations Officer Melanie Roussel.
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“We’re still asking the public, though, to check their video surveillance, their cameras, check their property in the area of the RM of Rockwood and near Stonewall or even in the RM of Mcdonald where the vehicle was recovered there near Highway 2.”
RCMP issued a Silver Alert, a notification of a missing vulnerable adult, for Campbell on July 18 on social media. The family of another missing Manitoba man is petitioning the House of Commons to create a National Silver Alert System that would send geographically-targeted notifications to cellphones in the area of the missing person.
While the RCMP has access to the National Public Alerting System, which sends emergency notifications to phones and broadcasts, they are not authorized to use it to push Silver Alerts.
“It’s just not in the criteria for that, so you would not never get a signal on your phone like you would do for a tornado watch or that kind of situation,” Roussel said.
Knor says an alert may have helped in Campbell’s case.
“He was quiet. He minded his own business. But if somebody had gotten a picture of him on their cellphone, they would have went, ‘Hey, I saw that guy,’ right? And maybe there would be reports,” she said.
Knor says she is trying to remain optimistic her relative will be found.
“The clock is ticking. He’s been missing now quite a long time,” she said.
She urges people in the Starbuck and Teulon areas to check their properties for him.
“He’s been a survivor and independent for most of his life, so I’m gonna cross my fingers that that has kicked in… and that he’s just somewhere we haven’t found him yet.
“But regardless of the outcome, we just want to find him.”
Manitoba RCMP describe Campbell as approximately five-feet-eight-inches tall, 110 lbs. with shaggy grey hair, blue eyes, and clean-shaven. Anyone with information is encouraged to call 911, Crime Stoppers, or the Stonewall RCMP at 204-467-5015.
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