CHICAGO (FOX 32 News) -
Chicago police and concerned family and friends will resume the search Thursday for Kahil Gray, a 15-year-old autistic boy who ran away from his father on Tuesday.
Surveillance video captured what started as a game of hide and seek and ended with Kahil walking out the front doors of the University of Chicago's Comer Children's Hospital on Tuesday
"It has been a living hell, you know, without my son - he has never been without us every since he was born, never. He has never wandered off before," said Beryl Gray, the teen's mother.
In tearful pleas to the public, Gray's mother stopped strangers, hoping someone recognized her son, the face featured on a missing person flier posted on a nearby bus stop and surrounding areas. The child's parents describe a teen with severe autism, who rarely if ever speaks and has the cognitive capacity of a toddler.
"He has the mentality of a 3 to 5-year-old at this time," said Gray.
"I said, 'We're getting ready to go now,' and he turned and run off and was laughing so that was like a game he was playing, a hide and seek so I said, 'Ding,' thinking that when I said that he would run and come back because he knows what elevators do, he didn't return," said Michael Gray, the teen's father.
Surveillance video taken from several angles shows Gray strolling down streets nearby.After leaving the hospital, he walked past a park near 57th Street and Cottage Grove Avenue and then continued.
Police say his movement is exaggerated and are hoping Gray's pronounced gestures and silence - will ring a bell.
"Kids with this type of autism such as he has, they might hide for a while, get in a secluded area but 24 hours starts to bother me that he hasn't come forward so my hope is that he may look like an ordinary kid, if he's walking he would kind of wave his hands a little and I'm hoping that somebody identifies with him," said Chicago Police Department Sgt. Jeffrey Coleman.
And now, amid the first heat wave of the summer, it's been more than 24 hours since the 15 year old was last seen.
His family and police fear time is working against them.
"They tend to draw to water so Washington Park is a huge park and we've been in that park looking around, we're going to continue, pass out distribute fliers there because there's a lot of people that visit the park there - a nice hot day, kids are going to be around water," said Coleman.
