Crews Continue Searching For Missing Man With Alzheimer's In Okmuglee County

Okmulgee County search crews are using an air-boat to search for a missing 84-year old man from Kansas.

Deputies say Donald Walters hasn’t been heard from since July 7th.

Deputies say hunters found Walter’s car on a dead-end road near the Deep Fork River, nearly 6 hours from where he lives.

They have no idea why he was there.

Deputies say Walters was reported missing on July 10, and his car was found on July 14th.

“It’s completely random. We’ve received word that he’s suffering from Alzheimer’s. We don’t know what ties he has to this area or why he came this way,” says Sergeant Aaron Swayze with the Okmulgee County Sheriff’s Office.

Deputies say the hunters found Walters car north of I-40, in the Tiger Mountain area.

Crews searched around his car and found items they believe belong to Walters.

Since then, they’ve searched almost every day for a week.

“The terrain is rough, swampy; it’s extremely thick,” says Sgt. Swayze. "There were times on the 14th that guys were on their hands and knees having to crawl through stuff.”

Sgt. Swayze says they’ve tried everything.

They’ve used Wagoner County Emergency Management’s airboat and Oklahoma Task Force One brought out a boat and search dogs.

Today, they search nine miles of the river in an area called the Hoffman Bottoms, but had no luck.

 “We are looking for anything that sticks out,” says Swayze. “We had two boats in the water. One boat was utilizing side scan sonar as well as a detection dog.”

Deputies say they’ve exhausted all of their options for now. They say if they get any new information they will search more. At this point, they consider it recovery mission because of how much time has passed.