Over our the past few weeks, there has been much buzz surrounding the disappearance of a Carleton student. After Carleton's Director of College Relations Joe Hargis released a prepared statement pertaining to the disappearance, it was thought that Carleton security had not contacted the Northfield Police Department as soon as they should have. Later, Carleton amended their story to accommodate a more responsible timeline, fixing the time discrepancy.

The last time anyone saw Roy Edward Salter was January 9, as he boarded a bus bound for the Minneapolis International airport. He was on his way home, to Fullerton California, for the rest of the semester. Fellow students and friends of Salter later described him as suffering from depression, thereby intensifying this missing persons case.

It became apparent that Salter boarded the bus for the airport, but never went to the airport, as his electronic ticket had not been authorized and his airline could not verify any exchange of a ticket. It was not known when or where Salter got off the bus. To many he just disappeared.

Through the search efforts it was discovered that Salter withdrew $200 before the day he boarded the bus. No other bank activity was noted. Police authorities were able to work with airlines to determine whether or not Salter traveled by plane to anywhere else. Since airlines only keep information of passengers for 24 hours after their flight, it was difficult to determine whether or not he boarded another plane.

Carleton did not break the law by not notifying the Police earlier. They simply delayed the time in which Salter's name was entered into the missing person's database.

Carleton first stated that they had been notified by Salter's parents of the disappearance of their son on January 16th, a week after he was to have flown home. The Police received notification of the disappearance approximately, 10:55 am on January 18th, leaving around 36 hours without the help of the Northfield police and the missing persons database.

When this statement by Carleton first came out, many thought that Salter's name should have been entered into the database as soon as it possibly could have. Carleton Security did not allow that to happen. It was also thought among many that the search efforts could have been changed. For example, if the police had been notified earlier, would they have had better luck tracking him down throughout airlines?

After this statement was released, Hargis then called the police stating that the prepared statement was wrong, that Carleton officials were not notified until the 17th,.

"There were a lot of different people with different information. We just got our timeline messed up," Hargis said.

"Nothing went wrong. There was just a little mix up within the Carlton officials and circumstances were misreported," said Northfield Police Chief Gary Smith.

Search efforts continued throughout the end of January and into February when police officials finally received a tip from a woman in Minneapolis who worked at a homeless shelter. This prompted police to search the homeless shelters throughout Minneapolis and fortunately, someone recognized one of the missing persons posters. Salter was found February 5th, almost a month after he ha disappeared.

"He has called his parents to tell them he is alright and that he needs no assistance," Smith said.

As for Salter's future at Carleton, "We assume that he will be returning back to school next fall," said Hargis.