Schizophrenic Andrew McArthur found in Belgium

Jul 30 2009 by Tom Mullen, The Journal

A SCHIZOPHRENIC who went missing from home for three nights has been found after he took a train to Belgium.

Andrew McArthur telephoned his distressed family early yesterday morning to say he was in Chester-le-Street, County Durham, and was safe and well.

The 23-year-old had disappeared from his mother Jean’s house in Christon Bank, near Alnwick, Northumberland, on Sunday while she was at church.

Andrew, who is on a strict regime of anti-psychotic medication, first travelled to Edinburgh, where he was spotted on CCTV, before flying to London where he made contact with his aunt, Judy McGirr.

Mrs McGirr told him to immediately take a tube to her house in the Muswell Hill area, but he instead took the Eurostar express train to Brussels, the Belgian capital.

By this time, a full-scale police search had been launched to try to find Andrew, but by Tuesday night the family were still anxiously awaiting news.

Then, an ecstatic Mrs McArthur answered the phone at around 5.55am yesterday morning to hear her son’s voice. She said: “I was overjoyed. He said his bank card didn’t work in Brussels and he came back because he had ran out of money. But he had managed to get himself around Europe and back.