Missing California teenager found this month outside Utah gas station

A California teenager reported missing three years ago was discovered sleeping outside a Utah gas station this month, police said. Connerjack Oswalt, 19, was arrested in the Park City area on April 9 after someone reported a man sleeping outside a gas station, according to Lt. Andrew Wright of the Summitt County Sheriff’s Office.

When deputies arrived, they scanned Oswalt’s fingerprints and discovered an arrest warrant for someone with a similar name that had been issued out of Nevada in February, Wright said, adding that additional research led them to Oswalt’s missing person poster in the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children database.

Deputies contacted police in Clearlake, California, where Oswalt was reported missing and located Oswalt’s mother in Idaho Falls, Wright said, which resulted in the pair being reunited in Utah.

Suzanne Flint, Oswalt’s mother, told MEDIA that her son left home after “someone supposedly promised him he could go on a journey to discover himself.”

“We’re still piecing everything together and going by what he told us,” Flint explained.

Oswalt, who is autistic, was reported missing on Sept. 28, 2019, at the age of 17, according to Clearlake Police Lt. Tim Hobbs.

Several people claimed to have seen him while he was missing, but none were reported to law enforcement until weeks or months later, police said. Oswalt was last seen in Willows, roughly 70 miles north of Clearlake, Hobbs said.

Residents in the Park City area had contacted the sheriff’s office in the weeks preceding Oswalt’s identification about a homeless man pushing a cart, Wright said.

“During each interaction with deputies, Connerjack provided no identifying information,” Wright said. “We had no reason to insist on his identification during previous encounters because he was not in violation of the law. Deputies, on the other hand, offered Connerjack resources such as transportation and food. He politely declined all offers.”

After Oswalt was recognized, social workers stepped in to assist him, Wright said.

Investigators remain perplexed as to how he wound up in Utah.

“This is still a significant question,” Wright told MEDIA. “Where did his two-and-a-half-year adventure take him? We assume he withheld identifying information out of fear of the police.”