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The Missouri ER doctor who vanished without a trace last week was texting his new fiancée the morning he disappeared — and even assured her that she would see him soon — before he suddenly stopped responding.
Dr. John Forsyth, 49, had texted his fiancée, who has not yet been identified, around 7 a.m. May 21 to let her know he had finished his shift at Mercy Hospital in Cassville.
“I’ll see you a little bit later,’” the doctor told her, according to an interview his brother Richard gave to the Daily Beast.
But within minutes, the father of seven stopped responding and was seen walking to the RV where he stayed in the hospital parking lot.
Security footage then showed Forsyth’s Infiniti sedan arriving at the nearby Cassville Aquatic Center before a white SUV pulled up near him.
“It leaves a few minutes later and [Forsyth] is seen walking around maybe 10 to 15 minutes after that,” Richard said he was told by police. “And then he walks away from his car.”
Later that Sunday, Forsyth’s car was found where he left it, unlocked with his keys, wallet and passport inside.
Richard revealed the vehicle was parked “in a very hidden location, in a place where it seems like cars are not supposed to go.”
Forsyth was reported missing after he failed to show up for his shift at the hospital that evening, something his family said was so unlike him, it was cause for alarm.
“He wouldn’t miss a shift even if his eyeballs were hanging out of their sockets,” Richard said. “It was an immediate red flag.”
Extensive searches of the 90-acre wooded area around where his car was found — which is under a mile from the hospital — turned up no signs of the doctor.
Richard told the Daily Beast he had last seen his brother during a two-hour dinner the week before he went missing, and that he “seemed really happy and excited” as he’d just gotten engaged days after his divorce was finalized.
“Nothing seemed weird,” Richard said. “Which makes John vanishing that much weirder.”
Forsyth’s son with his ex-wife, 23-year-old J.R., said he had plans to visit with him and family members in Utah the weekend after his dad vanished, but that he did not know his father had gotten engaged.
“He seemed very excited to come out,” J.R. told the Daily Beast. “We were all looking forward to seeing him and being together again.”
A week after Forsyth’s disappearance, no leads have emerged as to what may have happened to him or where he may be.
What to know about Dr. John Forsyth's mysterious death
Dr. John Forsyth’s body was found by a kayaker in an Arkansas lake — about an hour south of where he was last seen in Cassville, Missouri — with what appeared to be a gunshot wound, the Benton County Sheriff’s Office said in a release.
The 49-year-old doctor was first reported missing on May 21 after he failed to show up for his shift at Mercy Hospital, something that was out of character for the father of seven, according to his loved ones.
The last person believed to have been in contact with John was his new fiancée, whom he texted at 7 a.m.
The doctor got engaged three days before his disappearance and several days after he finalized his divorce from his first wife.
Officials have not shared the location of the wound or whether they believe Forsyth’s death was a suicide.
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He was described as 5 feet, 11 inches tall, about 180 pounds and wearing a black shirt and blue/gray pants when he was last seen leaving the hospital.
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