Missing Boy Found In Coopertown Friday Night, Full Story

According to Officer McDougal with the Coopertown police department, the boy was

Smokey Barn News, September 6, 2013 Coopertown TN

Missing Boy Found In Coopertown Friday Night, Full Story

Friday evening around 6:30PM a call came in about a 10 year old boy that was missing in a wooded area in Coopertown near Burgess Gower Rd and Sandy Springs. Early reports indicated he had run away from home. According to Officer McDougal with the Coopertown police department, the boy was afraid of the dark and it was getting darker by the minute. He was described as a 10 year old boy named Jason, slender, with a short crew cut, light brown hair and wearing a dark T-shirt with yellow lettering, blue jeans and carrying a purple backpack.

If you live in the area of Burgess Gower Rd and Sandy Springs in Coopertown it was hard to miss all the patrol cars, officials, helicopters, dogs and citizens with flashlights looking for the boy.

The Helicopter with infrared search technology was supplied by the Tennessee Highway Patrol. Blood Hounds Search & Rescue off of Sandy Springs heard about the story and came to offer their help. They have a great track record of finding all kinds of stuff with those amazing and very friendly dogs.

After we dropped the alert about the missing boy on our Facebook page it quickly soared to almost 300 shares in minutes and well wishers and prayer warriors commented with words of comfort to the parents. To see our original announcement and read the comments click here

It seemed that everyone was looking for the boy. Other than the THP’s helicopter and the Blood Hounds Search & Rescue folks, the Robertson County Sheriff’s office (who ran the search operation) and Coopertown police assisted. Coopertown Officer McDougal was actually off duty but he said “I have kids myself, if one of them was missing…” The neighbors were all out on their porches, people that read about the boy drove over and you could see them pointing their flashlights out their car windows.. There were reports of sightings through the night.

Coincidentally, Ms. Keisha Rhodes with Blood Hounds Search & Rescue lived near by and she got a call from her daughter asking if anyone was over near her house because she was outside and heard somebody say, “hey you”. Ms. Rhodes motherly instinct kicked in so she went to check on her daughter. When she arrived at the house she just happened to walk over by an old camper on the property and saw that a curtain was pulled back so she called out, “Jason are you in there” and low and behold, there he was.

“He was seen heading into the woods by a citizen around 7:30pm near Sandy Springs, so we knew we had him confined to that area. I think he saw all the lights by his home and was scared. He must have went back the other direction and found a place that felt safe to him, so he went inside the camper, laid down and went to sleep” said Officer McDougal.

Officer McDougal told Smokey he was headed down to the area where the dog handler was and Ms. Rhodes met him in route saying “I got him!” “The boy didn’t seem to want to talk so I asked Keisha if she would ride in the patrol car with me to take the boy home. When we got back to the boy’s house he ran up the front porch and his Mom met him with a big hug”, Officer McDougal said.

There were helicopters flying around, flashing lights everywhere and he is just 10 years old, he was probably scared quite a bit I’m sure. I don’t think he was afraid to be home, it was just all the action going on.” McDougal said.

The parents were very relieved to have their son home. Officer McDougal said he left around 11:30PM and the sheriffs dept was still there talking to the family. “They didn’t need my services anymore so I went home, I was just glad that Jason was safe and sound at home. ” McDougal said.

Needless to say, the parents of the boy are grateful to everyone that helped in the search.

Jim Ball reporting

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