Search underway in downtown San Diego for La Mesa man missing more than a week

La Mesa neighbors, family and friends have been searching for Mark Whitley, who was last spotted in the downtown neighborhood of San Diego more than a week ago.

Whitley's cousin Shameka Dixon was the last family member to see him when she took him to get treatment for his mental disabilities at the Jane Westin Wellness and Recovery.

“He went to the bathroom,” Dixon recalled. “He was in there about 15 minutes, and I knocked on the door. I'm like, ‘Mark, you know they’re waiting on you.’ ”

The next thing she knew, Whitley was gone.

When Dixon went outside, she found someone who had just seen Whitley.

“She said, ‘The boy, the boy,’ and she kept pointing back toward 10th Street,” Dixon said.

This clue started her search. After hours of scanning 10 blocks of downtown, Dixon called her grandmother, Emma Whitley, who filed a missing-persons report with the San Diego police.  

“I wasn't too alarmed because, you know, sometimes he walks out of here and goes for a walk for an hour or so and comes back,” Emma said.  

Whitley didn't have an ID, money or a phone when he went missing — all he had were the clothes on his back.

As one day without him turned into three, then turned into 10, his grandmother has started to worry.

“I’m holding out hope, but I have to think that something nefarious might have happened,” Emma told NBC 7.

Dixon said she couldn't help but feel a little guilty.

“He really didn't want to go,” Dixon said. “You know, I feel really bad because I made him. I'm like, ‘You have to do this,’ and now he's … we can't find him.”

The 40-year-old has lived in La Mesa almost his entire life. He knows the area well — but not the downtown San Diego neighborhood where he went missing.

Emma is praying that her grandson will somehow find his way back to her front door.

NBC 7 reached out to police for an update on their search but has yet to hear back.

The family has posted flyers all around downtown and in La Mesa as well. Emma said the neighbors know and love Mark, too and have all joined in on the search.

Anybody with information about Mark, who was last seen wearing black slacks and a brown hoodie, should contact the San Diego police.