Concern grows for fate of runaway Lake Stevens teen

Published 5:22 pm Saturday, October 25, 2008

LAKE STEVENS — He may have gone into the wild. Or a missing Lake Stevens boy could be hopping rail cars with dreams of becoming a modern-day hobo.

Nicholas A. Clark, 13, has a passion for the outdoors and has talked about a cross-­country trip.

He ran away nearly two weeks ago.

The boy is trained in survival and has hinted that he one day may try to cross the U.S., on foot, or possibly by riding the rails, Snohomish County sheriff’s spokeswoman Rebecca Hover said.

“Detectives believe he thinks he’s on the adventure of a lifetime,” she said. “He believed he has the skills to survive in the wilderness and on his own.”

On Oct. 13, he left a note for his mother saying he would get in touch with her in a couple of months once he reached his destination, Hover said.

“He didn’t say where that was,” she said. “Right now, it’s a guessing game.”

The sheriff’s office usually doesn’t ask for help in finding runaway teens, Hover said. Most teenage runaways return or call home within a few days. There’s been no word from Nicholas.

“Eleven days is a long time to be gone,” she said.

He also isn’t a typical disgruntled teen upset with his parents.

Nicholas ran away the day he was scheduled to start attending classes outside the home.

A loner, the boy had been home-schooled his entire life, Hover said. He may have been upset at the prospect of starting public school.

Officials are concerned the teenager has overestimated his survival skills.

Since he ran away, the weather has turned. Five inches of snow fell on Stevens Pass Monday night and temperatures in the mountains have dipped well below freezing.

While Nicholas has taken classes in outdoor survival and has experience camping, detectives are worried he might not have enough warm clothes or food.

“He does have training in that, but he’s 13 years old,” Hover said. “We don’t know if he has supplies with him, despite his training.”

There’s also the possibility that he could run into people who will harm him instead of help him.

“It’s not just an outdoors issue, it’s a safety issue,” Hover said.

Deputies searched the wooded area around the teen’s home in the 11000 block of 123rd Avenue NE. They were unable to track him.

Railroad officials have been alerted in case engineers spot Nicholas. Nothing has been reported, Hover said. The boy also was reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

Nicholas is passionate about the outdoors and enjoys reading books about wilderness survival.

By running away, he may have been emulating the fictional character Sam Grimley from the 1959 children’s novel, “My Side of the Mountain,” by Jean Craighead George. In that book, Sam runs away and lives in a hollowed tree, befriending raccoons.

Nicholas apparently was not influenced by the story of Christopher McCandless, the young man made famous in Jon Krakauer’s 1996 book, “Into the Wild.” McCandless believed he could live off the wilderness in the Alaskan backcountry. His body was found by a moose hunter.

The Lake Stevens boy is described as white, 5 feet, 5 inches tall, weighing 120 pounds with brown hair and brown eyes. He was last seen wearing green pants and a blue turtleneck sweater.

Now, the sheriff’s office is asking people to keep an eye open for the teenager.

“If they’ve seen him anywhere, if they’ve seen him walking along the railroad tracks, we want to hear from them,” Hover said. “That will help us place him somewhere along the way that might give us a lead as to where we should look for him next.”

Hover said detectives are hoping that the boy is still in the region.

“It would be much better if he was closer to home than halfway across the country,” she said.

Anyone with information is asked to call the sheriff’s office tip line at 425-388-3845 or 911.

Reporter Jackson Holtz: 425-339-3437 or jholtz@heraldnet.com.