Friends raise funds for family as search for boy continues

Colleagues of the father of 10-yearold Ariel Jeffrey Kouakou have launched a public fundraising campaign to support the missing boy ’s family as the fourth full day of an intensive search drew to a close with no promising new leads.

“We are launching this campaign in order to raise funds for our highly respected colleague and fellow teacher Frédéric Kouakou and his family following the disappearance of their son Ariel Jeffrey Kouakou on March 12, 2018 in Montreal,” reads an appeal on gofundme.com by staff members of Berges-de-Lachine school, where Kouakou works.

The page was created Friday afternoon and by 7 p.m., pledges were already more than $3,000 over the organizers’ $1,000 goal.

The stated goal of the appeal is to use the donations to ensure the family does not have to worry about money or work while searching for their son. The funds may be used to pay for catered meals, psychological support and childcare for their other child, a four-year-old girl, the appeal reads.

“This will allow them to concentrate their efforts and focus on the search for their son,” says the appeal by the École des Berges-deLachine Team.

Meanwhile, Global News is reporting that the family has hired a private investigator to help find the boy. Family members did not immediately return a phone call by the Montreal Gazette.

Montreal police continued to comb through the neighbourhood where the boy might have been seen and appealed again to the public for information.

“There’s still a lot of field work to be done,” said police spokesperson Jean-Pierre Brabant. “We’re going door to door today to try and get more information and we’re trying to get more visuals.”

Ariel left his home in Montreal’s Ahuntsic-Cartierville borough at 12:15 p.m. Monday to visit a friend a few blocks away, but the friend was not home. It was the first time his parents had given him permission to walk to his friend’s house by himself.

Reported missing by his parents on Monday afternoon, police would later learn from a witness that the boy was seen in Parc des Bateliers, a riverside park just half a block from the boy ’s Valmont St. home, at 2 p.m. that same day. Brabant said investigators are seeking fresh visuals from surveillance cameras as well as reviewing footage they already have in an effort to deduce what route he might have taken if and when he left that area.

On Friday police moved their mobile command post from the park to Les Galeries Normandie, a shopping mall on de Salaberry St. that the boy sometimes visited. Police are seeking tips and information from callers to 911.

“I know there have been a lot of 911 calls from citizens who say they saw the boy . ... We sent out patrol officers to verify the information but we haven’t found him so far.”

Police are making it clear no possibility is being dismissed — they have said the boy might have become lost, been abducted or fallen into the nearby Rivière des Prairies.

Thus far, a police helicopter, the police cavalry division, all-terrain vehicles and scores of volunteers have been deployed as part of the search. Their task was made more difficult by the snow that blanketed the city overnight Thursday.

Ariel stands 4-foot-7 and weighs about 90 pounds. When last seen, he was wearing a black hooded coat, grey pants and yellow shoes. Police say Ariel has never run away and has no behavioural problems.

Anyone who sees Ariel or has any information on his whereabouts is urged to call 911 or Info-Crime at 514-393-1133.