The search for a Newberg youth who went missing in late January has ended with his return.
Connor Reed, 17, was reported missing on Jan. 28 from a foster home in Newberg. He was found three days later, but officials from the Oregon Department of Human Services (ODHS) didn’t make that information known until Tuesday, Feb. 13.
Jake Sunderland, press secretary for the ODHS’ child welfare division, said he was advised that the youth had been found on Jan. 31, but failed to update the alert the agency had distributed looking for the public’s help. He added that he could not reveal the details of the boy’s return, where he was found, his condition, who found him or whether he was returned to the foster home from whence he disappeared.
“All we can disclose is the bare minimum in the alerts,” Sunderland said. “Federal child welfare policy laws are very strict.”
The department, in its Feb. 13 release, explained the parameters by which it operates in missing children cases.
“Sometimes when a child is missing they may be in significant danger and ODHS may need to locate them to assess and support their safety,” the release said. “As ODHS works to do everything it can to find these missing children and assess their safety, media alerts will be issued in some circumstances when it is determined necessary. Sometimes, in these situations, a child may go missing repeatedly, resulting in more than one media alert for the same child.”