This is actually a news article that was sent in to me. I wasn't sure where to post it, so I posted it in here. Enjoy!
Published in the Asbury Park Press 6/12/01 By AMY BRIA
FREEHOLD BUREAUFARMINGDALE -- A report by teen-age girls of a bloody hand reaching out from a bush near the railroad tracks kept police searching for an unknown man during much of yesterday afternoon.After nearly four hours of searching the woods with a tracking dog and a helicopter, State Police called off the hunt just after 4 p.m."We'll treat this as a person injured in the woods unless we hear different," Trooper Sean Mehrlander said.The unusual search in this small town, which doesn't have its own police department and instead relies on State Police protection, began with three eighth-grade girls on their lunch break and ended -- for now -- at the back door of a local bar.Mehrlander said the girls were walking along the tracks near Maple Avenue when they saw a backpack near the tracks above a creek. As they reached for the bag, they heard rustling and saw a man's bloody hand reaching from nearby bushes, Mehrlander said.The girls, whom police described as shaken up, ran back to Farmingdale School, where administrators called police.Patricia Munczinski, business administrator for the school district, said notes were sent home with all the students in the K-8 school about the day's events. The district also changed the open-lunch policy, which lasts from 11:50 a.m. to 12:50 p.m., for the final two full days of school, requiring students to be accompanied by a parent. Ordinarily children are allowed to leave the school for lunch on their own, if a parent gives prior approval."We were fortunate they made the right choice (by) coming back to school and reporting it right away," she said.Mehrlander, who is stationed at the nearby Allenwood barracks, said he got to the tracks almost immediately after the call."On our arrival, we saw a backpack, but no person," he said.Inside the backpack was a Bible, officers said. Police also found a white sneaker.Mehrlander said inside the Bible was the name of a man who might own the backpack, as well as a contact number. But officers only got an answering machine when they tried the telephone number, he said.Howell K-9 Officer John Lopez brought out a tracking dog, which followed a scent for about a mile along the tracks and through the woods to the back door of Tom's Tavern on Asbury Avenue, Lopez said.But inside the small bar was only a waitress and some regulars -- no one with bloody hands."Everybody who came in, I pretty much knew who they were," waitress Melanie Williamson of Farmingdale said.Bar patrons yesterday afternoon joked about who the missing person could be and why the tracking dog followed a trail to Tom's Tavern. As customers walked through the door, others yelled, "Do you have bloody hands?"Some just commented on why the trail led to the bar."I was making tuna fish, and I also threw some chili outside," Williamson said. "Maybe the dogs smelled the chili."
Published on June 12, 2001
Submitted by: mr0762