The deaf Guyanese man who disappeared in Queens, New York less than 12 hours after his arrival has been found.
According to the New York Daily News new immigrant Damon Mootoo, 32, spent five cold days wandering around Jamaica after he got lost during a walk in the maze of streets in Queens.
Mootoo was rescued on Sunday after Michael Bharath, on his way home from church, saw Mootoo near his 142nd Place house on Rockaway Boulevard. “He looked in desperation,” Bharath said. Mootoo’s relieved brother Mark Miller said, “When we saw him, he was just crying. He said, ‘I’m glad to see you.'” Mootoo said he was too intimidated to ask strangers for assistance and, after his ordeal the relieved man said, “I want to go home. I’m thinking about going back to Guyana.”
Mootoo lost his way on Wednesday after he left his brother’s Lot 152nd Street, south, Jamaica house to stretch his legs. The man left without wearing gloves or carrying any form of identification. “He said he was trying to find his way back,” Miller said. “He said he was just walking all over. He was scared. He [had] heard all the stories about New York.”
According to the Daily News Mootoo, who is hard of hearing, told relatives he didn’t want to approach the police because he feared that he’d be deported. The man said he survived by begging several homeowners for water, but said he was too ashamed and shy to ask for food or directions back to his brother’s residence. Mootoo said at nights, when the temperatures plunged into the low 20s, he slept in an abandoned car or sought shelter under a piece of wood in a yard.
Meanwhile, his panicked relatives had posted flyers with his picture across south Jamaica and had formed search parties. “We were thinking the worst after so many days,” Miller said.
But just when hope was fading, Bharath spotted him. Cynthia, Bharath’s wife made Mootoo a sandwich and, feeling secure, he told them his story, the newspaper said.
Bharath asked the man if he had anything with his relatives’ address written on it and sure enough Mootoo dug into his pockets and found a piece of paper with his stepmother’s Foch Boulevard address. Bharath drove Mootoo to the location and reunited him with his anxious family.
Of the experience, Bharath said, “When I see people in need, I try to help them. He was in need, I’m pretty sure that within a couple more hours he would have been a dead man.”
Mootoo was treated at the Jamaica hospital for dehydration and frostbite.
