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A man from California who disappeared without a trace 25 years ago will finally be reunited with his family. Marcella Nasseri identified a man in the news who looked like her missing brother, and the case was solved using fingerprint scans that had been taken decades ago.
Authored by Hank
Marcella Nasseri spent many years looking for her missing brother in Doyle, California, who she suspected had passed away 25 years ago.
Ms. Nasseri’s brother, who went missing in August 1999, has been located and confirmed to be in the Los Angeles region. Authorities revealed on Tuesday that he is now being reunited with his family.
The chain of events began when Ms. Nasseri came across an article in USA Today in May seeking assistance from the public to identify a patient discovered sitting on a curb in south Los Angeles a month prior. This patient had been residing in various emergency facilities, such as St. Francis Medical Center in Lynwood near Long Beach, California, for several weeks.
The article described a patient who was unable to talk and included a picture of a man in his 60s with gray hair and blue eyes, lying in a hospital bed.
Ms. Nasseri thought that the patient in the hospital was her long-lost brother, Tommy. She included a photo of Tommy when he was younger in a GoFundMe post without a specific date. Although the man in the hospital had lighter hair than Tommy, they shared similarities in their arched eyebrows, rounded nose, and deep-set eyes.
Ms. Nasseri reached out to local authorities to verify her suspicions. Deputy Sheriff Derek Kennemore from Lassen County in Northern California requested assistance from the Missing Persons Unit of the Los Angeles Police Department to collect fingerprints from the unidentified patient. This information was shared by the Lassen County Sheriff’s Office.
The detective was able to confirm that the man they found was the same person who was reported missing in 1999 from Doyle.
St. Francis Medical Center, the county sheriff, and Ms. Nasseri did not provide any comments in response to requests. It is currently unclear what Tommy’s condition is and how he went missing.
"In a social media post, Ms. Nasseri expressed that he disappeared without a trace, and even his vehicle was never found."
Currently, the siblings are making efforts to be together again. Ms. Nasseri resides in Lassen County, which is approximately 600 miles north of Lynwood, California, where her brother currently resides. In order to cover the expenses of a potential medical transfer and provide necessities such as men’s clothing, pencils, and paper for her brother to draw, Ms. Nasseri requested $500 in donations through a crowdsourcing platform.
In just two days, the page was able to gather close to $7,000 in donations.
Ms. Nasseri mentioned that part of the money would be used to purchase a device for her brother, allowing him to listen to songs that she recalls him enjoying, such as a song by Cyndi Lauper.
In one of the songs selected by Tommy, Ms. Lauper sings about being there to help if you ever feel lost. The lyrics repeat the phrase "time after time."
Hank Sanders is a journalist working for the Times and is part of the 2024-25 Times Fellowship program, which supports journalists who are just starting out in their careers. Learn more about Hank Sanders.
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