Missing elderly Philly man with cerebral palsy found dead

On January 30, a Philadelphia man living with cerebral palsy went missing after leaving work to go home. Three days later he was found dead.

The man disappeared during one of the coldest weeks in US history.

Last Wednesday morning, Gerald Fomalont, 60, left his home on the 9900 block of Bustleton Avenue to go to work, however, he didn’t return later in the day as expected. Police revealed that he walked toward Roosevelt Boulevard to catch one of two buses to take him home near Bustleton Avenue and Red Lion Road.

However, he never boarded any bus and never made it home. The following day, the police issued a missing person alert and searched for Fomalont.

The authorities failed to find the man who had a reduced mental capacity and cerebral palsy. On the day he disappeared, he was wearing a black nylon jacket, tan pants, and loafers.

On Saturday, Fomalont’s body was discovered by train tracks at approximately 2:48 p.m. in the 11300 block of Northeast Avenue. The location was a little more than a mile from his home.

The police said there were no obvious signs of trauma to his body. On Monday, his family identified Fomalont and an autopsy will be performed to help determine a cause of death.

At this stage, it isn’t clear if he was killed by the extremely cold temperatures with sub-zero wind chills. Midday, on the day Fomalont disappeared, the temperature dropped from the 30s to a record low of 7 degrees by midnight heading into Thursday.

Over the weekend, the weather reached below-freezing temperatures. Anyone with any information that can help with the ongoing investigation can contact the Northeast Detective Division at 215-686-3153 or 911.

On the same day that Fomalont went missing, Gerald Belz, 18, a second-year pre-medicine major at the University of Iowa was found on campus behind Halsey Hall at about 2:48 a.m. He was taken to the hospital where he later died.

In his case, officials believed that the cause of death was weather-related because at that time Iowa City was -51 degrees.