According to the article on CNN, he missed 3 weeks of school BEFORE his disappearance, he was attending community college and was 18, and therefore an adult. Per the article, colleges don't inform parents when their adult children miss school.
CNN article also stated "that while the tree was high (one officer reported 50 feet, another reported 30 ft), the rope was long, and his feet were actually just 2.5 feet from the ground".
CAIR ( Council on Islamic-Relations) is intervening for the family. They are listed on Wikipedia as an Islamic advocacy group, but have been criticized by the Anti Defamation League as having past ties to Hamas (terrorist organization). Wikipedia also claims the group has purported to have had anti-semites at its rallies. Another critic claims CAIR is an organization for "victimization".
While the above paragraph is information from Wikipedia only, this paragraph opinion only. I will be interested to see if my post is deemed "racist", or "Islamophobic", and therefore deleted by moderators. Any crime that involves a Muslim, or even any comment that is in any way deemed as not complimentary to Muslims, is deemed by CAIR as such. So it is easy to see why they are calling for this to be investigated as a hate crime. They have become quite powerful, because anyone who disagrees with them is automatically labelled a racist or Islamaphobe.
Despite that being said, I feel bad for the boy. The indications to me of him having missed school, and missed work, is that he either became involved with the wrong people, or was suffering from some kind of depression. It feels to me that something significant affected his life in such a way, that resulted in either his suicide, or death by other means.
