Police Seek Help in Finding Missing, Ill Teen-Age Boy

Police appealed to the public Friday to help find a 17-year-old schizophrenic with the mental and emotional development of an 11-year-old who has been missing since July 12.

Erick Scott Appel of San Bernardino becomes nervous and may experience auditory or visual hallucinations without medication.

“Erick is extremely trusting, vulnerable and susceptible. He is like a 10- or 11-year-old kid in a lot of ways,” said his father, Vince Appel. “I have a feeling he might have gotten in a car.

“I’ve felt pain I didn’t know a person could feel,” he said of his son’s disappearance. “I feel like a big hypodermic needle is in my heart. . . . I feel like someone is using him and he can’t get away.”

Press Conference

Speaking to reporters in Orange at a news conference sponsored by the Adam Walsh Child Resource Center, investigators said they do not believe Erick ran away.

“He always called somebody,” San Bernardino Sheriff’s Detective David Heard said. In addition, Erick left his boom-box radio, which he carried everywhere, at home because he was going on job interviews.

Heard said that while there is no specific evidence indicating foul play, the circumstances surrounding Erick’s disappearance are worrisome.

Martha Appel, his stepmother, said Erick appears normal and speaks normally, but that he tells fanciful, farfetched stories. He blinks his eyes deeply when nervous, she said.

Erick is 6 feet, 1 inch tall, weighs about 130 pounds, has blue eyes and brown, crew-cut hair. He was last seen riding his purple and white BMX bicycle on E Street in San Bernardino.

Anyone with information about Erick’s whereabouts should contact Detective Heard at (714) 387-3500 or Gary Whaley of the Adam Walsh Child Resource Center in Westminster at (714) 898-4802.