Days turned into a week near a sprawling county park in South San Jose. Commuters zoomed past Highway 101, as they always did, and hikers and bicyclists enjoyed the scenery under the sparkling afternoon sun.
But there was one disturbing change to the area that apparently nobody realized: A young man who had been missing for seven days since crashing his pickup lay in a deep thick brush of bushes and trees next to a freeway offramp, obscured from view. He was alive, but unconscious.
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On Wednesday, authorities revealed the harrowing tale of 25-year-old Michael Sanchez Jr., who was rushed to the hospital the day before after being found. Whether or not he will survive after spending an entire week alone, missing in the urban wilderness, is still in question. And now the California Highway Patrol, which initially searched for Sanchez at the crash site, is facing questions of its own on why officers didn’t find him, and why they abandoned their search after an hour.
“We were looking all over for this gentleman,” said CHP Lt. Les Bishop. “We not only searched the immediate area and the brush, but we checked the shoulders on the freeway, the neighborhoods and the adjacent park.”
The Andrew High Hill graduate’s family first reported him missing to the San Jose Police Department on Thursday night after he failed to show up at a funeral that evening. Detectives had little to go on, and came up empty when they started their search Friday.
But then the big break came Monday, when they learned that Sanchez’s 1991 tan Ford Ranger pickup truck had crashed at 1 a.m. on May 8 near Hellyer Avenue and Highway 101 in South San Jose, next to the 354-acre Hellyer County Park.
Witnesses saw a man climb out of the overturned pickup truck and leave the area before the CHP arrived. Officers along with local firefighters and the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office searched the surroundings for about an hour, using portable high-powered lights to illuminate the area, Bishop said.
San Jose detectives obtained full information on the crash Tuesday, when they went out and found Sanchez at 5:45 p.m. in a wooded area, hidden from the roadway — next to the crash site at the eastern edge of the county park.
“That’s where he was found, way down there and out of view,” said San Jose police Officer Jose Garcia.
His unresponsive body was taken to Regional Medical Center in San Jose, and authorities could not disclose his condition Wednesday. Police, however, said they had not been able to talk to him.
“To learn this person was out there for a week and be found alive is a huge moment” for family members, Garcia said.
Sanchez had called someone he knew about 10 minutes before the crash. He was last seen leaving his home for work the previous afternoon.
Bishop said information in the car led them initially to believe the missing person was from Visalia.
“Fortunately the CHP gave them a really solid lead,” said Garcia, who noted the CHP is now in charge of the investigation. “As far as the detectives are concerned, we’re definitely proud of the work they do on a daily basis.”
