Safe ending for missing teen
KINGMAN – A safe ending is reported in the location of a teenager who wandered away from a care facility in Kingman late afternoon Monday, Feb. 6. Deputy Kingman Police Chief Joel Freed said there was heightened concern because Ezekiel McLeod suffers significant mental health and communication challenges.
The teenager’s issues and history are sensitive, but Freed said McLeod was temporarily placed at a halfway house on Hualapai Mountain Road before planned transition elsewhere. The search for McLeod after he was reported missing continued Tuesday, concentrated along Hualapai Mountain Road where a command post was established.
A Good Samaritan located McLeod walking along Route 66 north of the Kingman Airport after 5 p.m. Tuesday, 24 hours after, and some 15 miles from where he went missing. The citizen provided food, water and save haven until authorities arrived for McLeod.
Freed said the boy was in good health, but that communication difficulty prevented officials from learning where McLeod spent the night. Freed said his family traveled from Yavapai County to reunite with McLeod.
Dave Hawkins
