MESA, AZ — Mesa police credit a good Samaritan with helping track down a man who went missing during his walk on Sunday morning.
According to Mesa police, Mark Todd, 76, was reported missing Sunday after leaving for his morning walk near Power & Thomas roads. Police said Todd had been diagnosed with dementia.
"There's a lot of desert area in there, a lot of things where people can fall, people can get disoriented, people can get lost," said Mesa Police Department Detective Rico Encinas.
Mesa police said officers responded and the department put bulletins out on social media. Police said a resident apparently saw the bulletin on social media and decided to take the search upon himself.
A VERY BIG THANK YOU to the Mesa resident who hopped on his bike and began searching the area after seeing the missing man Nextdoor post. This resident actually locating Mark before police did... you sir, make our job easy! 😉 #becauseofyou
— Mesa Police Dept. (@MesaPD) May 30, 2021
"Decided he was going to jump on his bicycle and go help us look," Det. Encinas said. "He started searching through the desert and apparently he located him before we did."
Police told ABC15 the 76-year-old is okay and that they are appreciative of the resident who took it upon himself to go out looking for the missing man.
"It is pretty rare," Det. Encinas said. "We were amazed by this person's selfless attitude and willingness to help... that's something as a department we're striving to do and build those relationships with our community members and in this case, it happened to work out pretty good."