Missing Teen With Autism Home for Thanksgiving

A New Jersey teenager with autism who went missing for a week before being found in Ohio is now back home.

Michael Karwan, 19, of Marlboro and his parents arrived at Newark Liberty International Airport on Wednesday night, one day after he was located at a men's shelter in Cleveland.

Monmouth County authorities say Karwan left his parent's home Nov. 11 and traveled by bus to Manhattan. He then went to upstate New York, Philadelphia and Pittsburgh before arriving in Cleveland on Saturday.

Karwan tried to check-in to an overcrowded men's shelter that day, but a staffer there referred him to another nearby shelter which took him in. But the staffer at the first shelter soon recognized Karwan from a Facebook newsfeed item and called Marlboro police, who contacted Cleveland police.

Officers who went to the shelter were able to confirm Karwan's identity, and he was soon reunited with his parents.

"It might be only seven days (he was missing), but for us it was an eternity," Karwan's father, Walter, told reporters during a news conference at the airport.

The elder Karwan says the family still doesn't know all the details of his son's time away from home.

"Michael's still confused a little bit. I want to really give him time to sort everything out," Walter Karwan said

Copyright AP - Associated Press
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