Family seeks help finding 55-year-old veteran missing in Las Vegas
Family members are asking the public to keep an eye out for a missing Las Vegas military veteran with medical issues who has not been seen or heard from for nearly a week.
Brittany Russell reported her father, John Russell, missing on Tuesday to the Metropolitan Police Department after a welfare check at his apartment near downtown Las Vegas turned up no sign of him.
She last spoke by phone with her father on Aug. 16, she said, one day before he was last seen by his neighbors at the HELP Las Vegas Veteran Apartments near Bonanza and Mojave roads.
“He never returned to his apartment,” she said, adding that it’s not like him to go this long without speaking to her. “We talk every day.”
Since then, Brittany Russell said, she and her family have been calling his cell phone, which has been going straight to his voicemail, and local hospitals. She also has been checking with the Clark County coroner’s office and even the local jails.
Metro spokeswoman Laura Meltzer said Friday that the case remained open.
Worried he may be hurt and in need of medical help, Brittany Russell told the Las Vegas Review-Journal on Friday that her father has a history of medical problems and can’t stand on his own for extended periods of time.
He also had just gotten out of the hospital after receiving extended treatment for a bleeding ulcer days before he went missing, she said.
“You always see missing persons flyers, but you never think that your dad will be the face of one,” she said.
She described her father as a heavy set 6-foot-1 man with short, black hair and hazel eyes.
Anyone with information about Russell’s whereabouts may call Metro’s missing person detail at 702-828-2907 or 702-828-3111.
Contact Rio Lacanlale at rlacanlale@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0381. Follow @riolacanlale on Twitter.
