Dave Duda Photos
Cops detain a man near Gateway Community College …
… until ambulance crew arrives to return him to hospital. It was later determined he was not the man being sought.
(Update) A topsy-turvy search for a homeless man who had left Yale New Haven Hospital while under quarantine and treatment for covid-19 has ended with the person being located and in isolation, police reported.
The saga began Sunday morning at 10:40.
A hospital security staffer reported that the man had been held under quarantine there by order of the city Health Department after testing positive for covid-19. The patient headed out on foot and turned left onto York Street from the hospital’s entrance.
The patient was described as a white man last seen wearing a black leather jacket, grey hooded sweatshirt, black jeans, and black baseball hat, and carrying a black backpack. He was born in 1969.
Police Chief Otoniel Reyes made a dramatic announcement at 4:36 p.m. at the end of an online (via Zoom) daily press briefing with city officials on the coronavirus crisis.
Paul Bass Photo
“The individual that we were looking for is in custody,” Reyes (pictured) announced as the half-hour briefing was coming to a close.
Police said the man was compliant when officers found him downtown near Gateway Community College. They handed him a mask, which he put on, while waiting for an ambulance to transport him back to the hospital.
The ambulance arrived shortly before 5 p.m.
But then it turned out … he was the wrong guy. The infected man remained at large.
Then, slightly before 7 p.m., “authorities located the missing man in Milford,” police spokesman Capt. Anthony Duff reported in a release. He reported that city health officials “are now coordinating efforts with Milford officials.”
The city is in the process of converting Hill Regional High School into a 75-bed center for homeless people who have covid-19 and don’t need to be in the hospital. Police officers are to guard the facility so people don’t escape.
