Breaking news update:
A 95-year-old Holocaust survivor who went missing on his way to a doctor’s appointment Tuesday was found and reunited with his family Wednesday, according to Hatzolah of Los Angeles.
The emergency services group says it was contacted by L.A. police for mutual aid, and its volunteers combed the city for Carthay resident Karl Wozniak. The rescue squad found Wozniak around 9:30 p.m., Hatzolah said, though it did not specify where.
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Investigators are seeking the public’s help in locating a 95-year-old Holocaust survivor who disappeared after heading to a doctor’s appointment in Mid-City Tuesday.
Karl Wozniak left his home in Carthay around 1 p.m. for the Kaiser Permanente medical building at 5971 Venice Blvd. but never made it to the appointment, his son, Jerome Wozniak, said.
Jerome Wozniak said his father usually doesn’t have a problem driving. When he’s gotten confused and made a wrong turn before, he’s driven back to his residence in the area of Pico Boulevard and Point View Street — just over a mile away from his doctor’s office.
Just over 24 hours after he went missing, there’s been no sign of Karl Wozniak, his son said.
“He’s a sharp guy,” Jerome Wozniak told KTLA. “We don’t know what happened. He just disappeared.”
He says his father had his wallet with ID and credit cards — which haven’t been used thus far — but left his phone at home. Jerome Wozniak’s phone number should be in his pocket, and he had taken the blood-thinner medication he needs to take with him to the doctor.
The 95-year-old was driving a black, 2005 Toyota Avalon with California license plate No. 6JJF583. He’s around 5 feet, 10 inches tall, weighs about 145 pounds and was last seen wearing a blue jacket with gray pants and a baseball cap.
Jerome Wozniak describes his father as a “tough guy.”
“He remembers all the old war stories,” he said. “He’s an old guy, but he’s a fighter.”
Karl Wozniak was born in Cologne, Germany, but fought alongside Russian troops during World War II, according to a 2014 profile in the Jewish Journal.
The second-youngest of five children, he and his mother fled their hometown to join his father and older brothers in Poland when he was about 14, after living through Kristallnacht.
Jerome Wozniak said his father was a paratrooper and fought on the front lines.
After the war, Karl Wozniak moved to Israel, where he met his wife, Hildegarde Joseph. Jerome Wozniak said his parents are still together, and his mother is now 94.
“She’s at home, worried sick,” he said. “I’m running back and forth to check on her.”
The couple moved to Los Angeles in 1962 and went on to run a photo shop in Westwood before retiring in 2004.
Karl Wozniak was reported missing Tuesday, and California Highway Patrol and the Los Angeles Police Department have been investigating the case since.
“This has been really, really tough,” Jerome Wozniak said. “I just want him back to make sure he’s safe and hasn’t been hurt somehow.”
Anyone with information on Karl Wozniak’s whereabouts should call 911 or LAPD’s missing person’s investigators at 213-996-1800.