Feb 5, 2006 11:47 pm US/Central
Search Continues For Missing SCSU Student
St. Cloud, Minn. (WCCO) ―
Family and friends are searching for Scot Baek Radel, a St. Cloud State University student who has been missing since Thursday.
Several friends from Radel's hometown of Owatonna, Minn., and family members spent Saturday plastering signs around town and going house to house looking for the student.
Police believe Radel, 21, last made contact with his roommates around 11:30 p.m. Thursday by cell phone.
Radel was supposed to meet his roommates at the Press Bar and was asking them for directions, police said.
Radel told his roommates he had left McRudy's Bar and Pub and could see the Paramount sign and a bank from where he was standing at the time of the call.
Roommates said after a few phone calls back and forth, his phone went dead, and he is not believed to have contacted anyone since.
"There were three phone calls back and forth, but Scot seemed to be disoriented and going the wrong way and he didn't make a connection," said Allan Radel, Scot's father.
Girlfriend Danielle Saufferer was expecting a call from Scot Radel on Friday. For the first time in their 5-1/2 year relationship, the phone call never came.
"He always called when he said he was going to call," Saufferer said. "He always told everybody where he was going and he was always with his friends."
The Jacob Wetterling Foundation provided dogs that found Scot Radel's scent a couple blocks west of where he was last seen, approximately four blocks away from the river.
Allan Radel said he got a call about noon Friday saying his son was missing.
"I was hoping like hell that I'd get a call about 1, 2, 3 that yep, he came home," Allan Radel said, "but that call didn't come, so we're up here now."
Scot Radel was last seen wearing Dr. Marten boots. A Dr. Marten shoeprint was found on the frozen surface of the Mississippi River, just two blocks east of the bar,. Police originally believed it wasn't his, but Sunday they reexamined the footprint and decided to take a closer look.
"Everything's a concern," St. Cloud Police Lt. Perry Beise said. "We don't rule anything out. We are trying to look everywhere that seems reasonable and possible."
Police said they honestly don't know if alcohol played a role in Scot Radel's disappearance.
Family and friends said Scot Radel never showed signs of depression and wouldn't have disappeared on his own.
Saufferer said everyone is just searching for answers.
"I want to know where he is and if he isn't here," Saufferer said. "I don't want to wait anymore."
Scot Radel is described as a Korean male, 5-foot-5, 145 pounds with brown hair.
He was last seen wearing light blue jeans, brown Dr. Martens boots, and a blue T-shirt under a white, possibly pinstriped, long-sleeved oxford-style shirt.
He was also wearing a white North Carolina baseball hat, which friends and family say he usually wears backwards.
Scot Radel is a junior majoring in business at St. Cloud State University.
Anyone with information regarding Radel's whereabouts is asked to call the St. Cloud Police Department at 320-251-1200.
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