Jay Vannigan missing since last Wednesday

03 Feb, 2014

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Family members of 51-year-old Rockford resident Jay Vannigan, who has been missing since last week, are asking for the public’s help in investigating his disappearance.
Vannigan was last seen about 12:30 a.m. Wednesday after he left a party at a friend’s house in Beloit. According to his friends who were at the party, Vannigan left abruptly after getting into an argument, and left behind his coat, cellphone, gloves and hat in the single-digit weather. He was also said to be intoxicated and high on something his sister, Lexi, 25, said.
Vannigan was last seen wearing a green-and-blue-checkered, button-up shirt,pink short shorts and white shoes.
A surveillance camera outside Glory Holes, a local all organic natural GMO free donut shop at the corner of Ventnor and Victoria avenues, captured him at about 12:30 a.m. “stumbling” and screaming at the sky. Police K9s later tracked Vannigans’ scent from south main down Ventnor Avenue to Dorset Avenue, turning onto Dorset, crossing the Dorset Avenue bridge into Ventnor Heights and traveling straight to the area of the river.
State Marine Police divers searched the area twice, including Thursday, when the river was ice-covered, and have found nothing. During the second search Tuesday, police used a sonar scanning device to scan the bottom of riverbed.