GUILTY MI - Ricky Holland, 7, Williamston, 1 July 2005

http://www.freep.com/news/statewire/sw118011_20050705.htm

7 year old boy missing for 4 days. He is bi-polar and has attention deficit. Authorities believe he ran away from home.

@Juliana

If you can find a picture of him, I will place him on our site.

nvfc said:

@Juliana

If you can find a picture of him, I will place him on our site.

Click to expand...

There's a picture at this link. Sorry, I don't know how to copy and save the picture by itself.

http://newscenter.ninn.org/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=11737

Here is a link to the local paper's latest article:

http://lsj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050705/NEWS01/507050332

There's a picture there, but it's not a very good one.

Ricky Holland has bipolar disorder and ADD. The authorities believe that he ran away (he has before). He took his backpack, but they don't believe he took his medications with him. Sadly, they're afraid he may have fallen into the river that runs through Williamston. Two experts from NCMEC arrived yesterday to assist.

From here :

On Friday night, Lisa bought the movie "The Pacifier" because Ricky, a Vin Diesel fan, wanted to see it. They watched it together.

The next morning Lisa went out to the store just before 8 a.m. She soon returned because she'd forgotten something. She asked Tim to get the children up and then left again.

Tim knocked on Ricky's door and told him it was time to get up.

"I probably should have opened the door and checked on him, but I trust him," Tim said.

He was putting bread in the toaster when he stopped.

"He was being too quiet," said Tim, who is in the armed forces.

The first thing he saw when he walked into Ricky's first-floor bedroom was the open window.

Next, he noticed the bed had been pushed up to the window - and Ricky's blue backpack was gone.

"This is how this whole nightmare started, and that's what this is," Tim said.


Can a 7-year-old push a bed against a window?

amandab said:

Can a 7-year-old push a bed against a window?

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It would depend on how heavy it was...I think I was probably pushing furniture around by the time I was 7.

And is it just me or does anyone else get frustrated that they don't put better pictures out of a missing child (or adult for that matter)? I think EVERY parent should make sure they have current clear pictures of their child just in case...

I have added his picture with the news.

I see the Amber Alert has been issued.


This can be e-mailed
http://nvfc.us/content/view/395/1/

nvfc said:

I have added his picture with the news.

It says Amber alert on the supplied photo. Could someone clarify?


This can be e-mailed
http://nvfc.us/content/view/395/1/

Click to expand...

In Michigan we can have Amber Alerts without witness or vehicles. That's why I was so confused that other states don't. If a child is missing here, it is usually an Amber Alert immediately. The downside is that online local news rarely posts photos of the child so if you miss regular news or do not get the paper, you can read the story online but not have a clue what the child looks like.

And on the third day of hundreds of volunteers and about 50 officers searching for Ricky, police said they were no closer to finding him.

Two experts from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children arrived Monday to provide advice and help spread the word.

Meanwhile, Ricky's parents, Tim and Lisa Holland, said the ordeal is taking its toll.

If someone has Ricky, they pleaded, just drop him off where he can tell someone who he is.

"If somebody's seen him," Tim said on the porch at their Douglas Road home, "please tell the sheriff's department."

"Right now I feel numb," he said. "I feel like I have nothing left to give. All I have left is hope and prayer."

http://www.lsj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050705/NEWS01/507050331/1002/opinion

Two experts from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children arrived Monday to help with the search for Ricky Holland.

Joe Burgoon and Lee Manning both belong to the nonprofit organization's Team Adam. The 49 members of the team - mostly retired law enforcement agents - travel around the country assisting local authorities. The team is named after Adam Walsh, who was kidnapped and killed in the 1980s.

"These guys bring experience to the scene," Ingham County Sheriff Chief Deputy Vicki Harrison said.

"They also have resources and a network of people and organizations that are able to assist."

http://www.lsj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050705/NEWS01/507050332/1001/news

The search for a missing 7-year-old boy suspected of running away from home entered its fourth day Tuesday after police and hundreds of volunteers failed to find him over the holiday weekend.

http://www.freep.com/news/latestnews/pm4886_20050705.htm

He has been re-classified on the NVFC and this is new.

http://nvfc.us/content/view/395/34/

I sure hope these footprints are a positive sign. I just hope they find him soon before some sicko does.

http://www.lsj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050708/NEWS01/507080331

http://www.detnews.com/2005/metro/0507/08/B07-240704.htm

I was thinking about him yesterday...I do hope they find him soon. I have to wonder if he's with somene? Where is he sleeping? Imagine being 7 yrs old and out there on your own like this

Investigators called off the ground search Sunday night, saying they thoroughly checked a more than one-mile radius and have come up empty.

Ricky's parents are still asking people to be on the lookout.

http://www.woodtv.com/Global/story.asp?S=3576378&nav=0RcebyLp

As they head into the ninth day of the search, police are struggling to find leads and keep searchers optimistic.

A possible sighting at the Okemos Wal-Mart turned out to be another false alarm, and his parents pleaded again for anything that will bring Ricky back to them.

"We're still hoping and praying that tomorrow will be the day he comes home," Tim Holland said Saturday night. "If somebody out there has him, please return him. Our family is not whole without him."

Lisa Holland, barely able to talk through tears, urged anyone with even the smallest piece of information to call police.

Police believe he ran away and may be resourceful enough to be eluding searchers, but they aren't ruling out the possibility that someone abducted him after he left home.

Searchers found a second Welch's fruit snack wrapper, and police were determining whether it matches the box in the Hollands' home.

A similar wrapper was found last week near M-52 and Haslett Road but could not conclusively be linked to Ricky, in part because police did not have his fingerprints for comparison.

Authorities believe Ricky, the oldest of five children in the Holland home, packed fruit snacks and other items in his backpack before running away.

The Michigan State Police forensics unit was working Saturday to collect Ricky's fingerprints at his home.

http://www.wzzm13.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=41829

After nine days of searching - with hopes raised then dashed over possible sightings - volunteers looking for Ricky Holland were told not to come back today.

Ingham County sheriff's officials stopped the ground search at 5 p.m. Sunday for the still missing 7-year-old, who disappeared over the Fourth of July holiday weekend.

Without confirmed traces within 1.2 miles of his Douglas Road home, officials are 80 percent sure Ricky isn't in the area.

"I want to stress that doesn't mean he's still not out there," Harrison said. "We can't say with 100 percent certainty that he's not there."

Harrison said Tim and Lisa Holland, Ricky's parents, who adopted him when he was about 3, asked that information not be "sugarcoated."

"They took it hard, which is to be expected," she said.

http://www.lsj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050711/NEWS01/507110345/1001/news

Wait a minute. He's JUST 7 years old! A "runaway" at age seven???!!! I don't think so. And he left, when, on his own? How early? Most children I know prefer to sleep in, and be nudged at that age. Not planning to awaken, leave home, sleep under the trees, and eat mud pies from now on. Scaling back the search? What on earth for? He's most likely near the house, if some nut didn't get him. Or maybe there's more to the homefront story. It always bothers me that so many children are diagnosed as bi=polar, and ADD.
Please get home safely, little one.

This is so sad. Do they know what caused him to runaway? I mean besides him being bipolar and ADD? I mean, I guess I can't understand why a 7 year old would runaway, unless he's being mistreated or misses his mother or something.

I hope they find him, ugh I can't even begin to imagine a little 7 year old all alone on the streets. Where is the poor thing sleeping?

I pray that angels are surrounding him and keeping him safe from all those monsters out there.

Where could this little guy be? He's so little to be out there by himself. When he ran away before I wonder if he had a certain place is was headed for. He's just so little to take off on his own. I wonder if he is around home but hiding and not answering when searchers called his name.

I'd go crazy if they stopped searching. Why not expand the search further from the home? He is little but he could probably do some traveling further than a mile from home if he wanted to. How are those parents supposed to eat or sleep knowing that little guy is out there without food and it probably gets cold at night.

My heart goes out to this mom and dad and I pray that they find that little guy soon. How horrible.

I'm pretty sure one of the articles I read said that Ricky is adopted, they have adopted all of his siblings except one and they are in the process of adopting that last one. Ricky has gone off on his own before but never for this long. His biological mother, who lives in Jackson, is not considered a suspect. His biological father is in jail in Colorado. Ricky took his piggy bank, 12 fruit snacks and his favorite action figures with him.

http://lsj.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050708/NEWS01/507080331
"Authorities have said Ricky, who has attention-deficit (hyperactivity) disorder and bipolar disorder, is resourceful. They believe he could elude police for this long; they said he became streetwise while living a transient lifestyle with his biological mother.

Casey Jo Gleason, 24, denied Thursday that she lived like that.

"The last time I saw him was when he was 3," she said, "so how could I teach him how to hitchhike and scavenge for food?"

She said she is living in Harrison, about 100 miles north of Lansing, and doesn't have transportation to come help with the search.

Ricky is the oldest of five children in Lisa and Tim Holland's home. They have one biological child, and have adopted Ricky and two of Gleason's other children. They are in the process of adopting the children's other sibling.

The Holland family is staying as positive as possible, said spokesman Rod Weston, who is Ricky's cousin and an editorial assistant at the State Journal.

The younger children adore Ricky, often following him around the house and imitating him. "They don't understand what's going on,'' Weston said.

Police told the Hollands to stay home so they can bring Ricky to them. Weston said that's what's hardest for his uncle, Tim.

"Inside he's screaming, and not being able to do anything is killing him," Weston said."