A Mississippi mother is still searching for her son who went missing in Lee County after Hurricane Ian

LEE COUNTY, Fla. – There are 61 confirmed deaths in the aftermath of Hurricane Ian, but many are still unaccounted for. A Mississippi mom is worried about her son’s whereabouts.

37-year-old David Weaver moved to Fort Myers about nine months ago from Picayune Mississippi.

Laura Dugas is still in Mississippi, but she can’t sleep at night because her son is still gone.

She last heard from him in July.

“He was in jail there and he sent us a message to let us know what was going on with him,” Dugas said.

Since then there has been radio silence.

“He hasn’t had any contact with us so it’s weird, you know, not at all,” she said.

Not knowing if he is safe takes a toll on their entire family and his three children.

“I mean, I try to imagine that he’s just there, but I don’t know what’s going on with him,” Dugas said.

Lee County Sheriff Carmine Marceno said Weaver is not the only one still missing.

“Unfortunately, we still have missing persons, we have three cases where people have gone missing and we haven’t located them,” he said.

Marceno explained that it is difficult when there is no permanent address to locate these missing people.

“When someone is lost or missing and homeless, we don’t know if God forbid they were hurt or they were hurt in a storm — or if they heard word of mouth that a storm is coming and they’re leaving,” he said.

That’s what Laura hopes David Weaver has done.

“He went through Katrina with us here and we actually worked during and after the hurricane to help people recover and I hope he uses some of the knowledge he learned then,” Dugas said.

She will be in Fort Myers this weekend with her daughter to hopefully find answers to her son’s whereabouts.