Police call on additional resources to search for missing man Gary

The Courier

Police are searching a wide area as they attempt to locate missing 75-year-old man Gary, who suffers from dementia

Transcript

00:00Brett Hall, Acting Inspector of Ballarat and Local Area Commander.

00:03Beautiful, Brett, you can just put your back socks all over him.

00:06I guess, tell us why we're out here tonight.

00:08Yeah, so we're looking for a 75-year-old male by the name of Gary Butt.

00:13Gary went missing from the family home overnight on Saturday night, just gone.

00:17Gary suffers from dementia.

00:19And we know that he went to bed on Saturday night

00:23and his wife reported the missing to us.

00:26And she realised that he was missing from the family home on Sunday morning.

00:31Is this unusual for Gary?

00:33Due to his medical condition, Gary does tend to wander off from home on occasion.

00:38But he's never been gone for this long and always comes back.

00:40The fact that we're now at Wednesday and he's still missing,

00:45it can be a concern for us, obviously, and his family.

00:47How desperate is the police search been so far

00:50in terms of resources and what you've had to do?

00:52Yeah, so we typically have directions of travel for missing persons.

00:57Unfortunately for Gary, we don't at the moment.

00:58We don't really know where he got to, where he is.

01:01So our search is quite wide.

01:04With that in mind, we've enlisted additional resources from Melbourne

01:08through the Public Law Response Team.

01:11We've utilised our own local drone capability for around the areas.

01:15And we were recently able to ramp it up to 50 SES

01:18to start doing some searching of the Greenbelt areas around Ballarat.

01:22How concerning is this for day three and no sighting of Gary anywhere?

01:28Yeah, as the day goes on, it gets more and more concerning.

01:31Obviously, we need to consider if Gary's potentially out in the elements.

01:35One of our, you know, might be worries that Gary's actually sheltered up somewhere.

01:40And if that's the case, then the chances of Gary surviving is a lot higher.

01:44But we have to consider all possibilities.

01:47And how are the families dealing with the possible updates?

01:50Yeah, as you can imagine, the family are keen to see Gary home safe and well as a boy.

01:55And that gives you a bit of advice.

01:58Almost hourly contact with the family in relation to updates backwards and forwards.

02:02Like I said, it could be a matter of how happy he is.

02:05Maybe sometimes they just can't express who he is and where he lives.

02:08So is that a possibility?

02:10Yeah, that's exactly right.

02:11And what we would ask the community is that Gary isn't a risk to anybody.

02:16Gary is a 75-year-old male that's unwell and quite potentially disorientated and lost.

02:23And he just needs some help.

02:25And if anyone comes across him, I would ask that they would extend him that help.

02:28And whilst calling AAA so we can come and get him back to his family safe and well.

02:33The conditions today must be, you know, a point of concern for police as well.

02:37It's cold and people out there wandering around.

02:40Yeah, that's right.

02:41I wouldn't want to be out wandering around when it's cold and it's windy like this.

02:45So all my request is to get him back home safe and well.

02:48Can you give us a description of Gary?

02:50I know you're from Leesdale.

02:51Yeah, so Gary's picture's on our iWatch page.

02:55But he can be described as being an average size girl.

02:59His standard feature would be that he's got grey hair that's tied back in a ponytail.

03:03And he has a full set of grey beard.

03:07Typically wearing a black coat and quite often with a beanie.

03:10We also have another search that's happening today.

03:15Can you tell us a bit about a bit of the conditions

03:18that the Search and Rescue are facing out there?

03:22Oh yeah, so I haven't had anything to do with that search effort.

03:25So it wouldn't be released at Metacom on any of that.

03:28I'm hoping to say that it's continuing on and that's an ongoing investigation.

03:33Just more about the conditions out in the Enfield State Forest.

03:37And the charge that forces the police.

03:38You know, obviously if you talk generally about searching in those sort of areas,

03:43heavy forested areas, obviously it's tough on the foot.

03:45The weather would be one of the challenges for the searchers.

03:50But the effort continues to try and find somebody to get around on with the family.

03:55And there's the possibility that there's mine shafts out there too.

03:58That's one reason why the public being told not to go out.

04:02Yeah, that's right.

04:03You know, Ballarat's famous for a lot of things.

04:05One of them is mine shafts everywhere.

04:07So we need to ensure that everybody is safe.

04:09And it's quite a consideration to hunt mine shafts.

04:12But we need to get people away from them.

04:16In terms of the search for Gary,

04:18has there been no signs of him, eyewitness, CCTV, anything?

04:21We have had a couple of possible signs through CCTV.

04:24One even extended into the Melbourne CBD.

04:27But unfortunately the couple we have had haven't panned out.

04:31Whilst being a close resemblance to Gary, we weren't in fact Gary.

04:33But regardless, I would encourage anyone that thinks they might see Gary

04:37to give Tripwire a call so we can get him some help.

04:40And just in a broad context on the search of Gary,

04:44how do you train the police to find some answers for that poor human being?

04:49Again, that's an ongoing investigation.

04:51That hasn't been well enough of a running stretch.

04:54And there's a commitment to request that they continue.

04:58Hopefully they'll be able to provide the family with some closure.

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