On Tuesday, the mother of Maddox Ritch — the 6-year-old boy who disappeared from a North Carolina park over the weekend — pleaded for help locating her child Mother of Missing Boy with Autism Cries While Pleading for His Return: 'I Want My Baby Back' Carrie Ritch just wants to hold her son again. On Tuesday, the mother of Maddox Ritch — the 6-year-old boy who disappeared from a North Carolina park over the weekend — appeared at a press conference where she pleaded for help locating her child. Get push notifications with news, features and more. “I just want my baby home, please,” Carrie said. “Whatever you can do. Maddox is my whole world, and my reason for living. He’s momma’s boy.” “I want my baby back in my arms,” she added. Maddox, who has autism and limited verbal skills, was walking with his father and another adult at Gastonia’s Rankin Lake Park around 1:30 p.m. local time on Saturday when he took off running. Maddox hasn’t been seen since, and more than a dozen law enforcement agencies and have launched a days-long search to find the little boy. “If you were at the park Saturday and saw Maddox, please, urgently, please, call the tip line, please,” Carrie said on Tuesday. “Maddox loves the park. He loves bouncy balls and he loves his teddy bear. His smile is so contagious and his laughter so precious. If you think that you have seen Maddox, please reach out to police.” IR2 Maddox Ritch | Credit: Courtesy Ian Ritch A $10,000 reward is being offered for Maddox’s recovery. The boy is 4’0″ and was last seen wearing an orange T-shirt that read “I am the man” along with black shorts. The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children is also assisting in the search, and officials wrote on the site that Maddox may be in need of medical attention. In a Facebook post on Monday, Carrie wrote that authorities are doing all they can to find her son. “My main focus is bringing him home,” she said. “Thank you all for your love and support. I am completely heartbroken. I need him home. I want him in my arms. I want to see his smile and hear his precious laughter. I know God is with him protecting him.” IR1 Ian (left) and Maddox Ritch | Credit: Courtesy Ian Ritch Meanwhile, Maddox’s father Ian Ritch told PEOPLE on Tuesday that he’s overcome with guilt, wishing he had done things differently. “These past few days have been hell for me. I’m so broken. I’m heartbroken,” Ian, 42, of Concord, said. “Every time it gets dark at night I burst into tears because I’m thinking, ‘My little boy is out there alone.’ The longer [the search is] going the harder it gets because I’m so worried. He hasn’t had anything to eat or drink.” Ian explained that he and his friend were walking with Maddox near the lake when the playful boy took off running behind a jogger. It’s common for Maddox to run around, so Ian allowed the boy to jog ahead for fun. But when Maddox began running faster, Ian said he took off after him and wasn’t able to catch up with his son before losing sight of the boy. “I was terrified. I didn’t know which direction he went so I looked as hard as I could, I went different ways and everything,” the grieving father said. “I tried to find him. I don’t know where he went. Usually when he takes off running he’ll slow down and stop for me to catch up with him. This time he never stopped.” maddox-ritch-1 Maddox Ritch | Credit: FBI Park staff helped Ian search the area before calling police. Carrie was “hysterical” when he broke the news to her over the phone, he claimed. Both Ian and Carrie are cooperating with police in the investigation, city officials confirmed to PEOPLE. FBI officials in Charlotte have also joined the search, and one agent, Jason Kaplan, said in a weekend news conference that authorities are working to determine whether Maddox was abducted or is simply lost. “I was thinking he was lost in the woods, now I’m not so sure,” Ian told PEOPLE. “They’ve been looking for days and haven’t found anything. I’m starting to worry. It’s been too long. They had so many search and rescue [teams] that they should have found him by now.”<doc-sep>The latest on coverage for the search for Maddox Ritch, a 6-year-old autistic boy who was reported missing Saturday from Rankin Lake Park. 4:39 PM The mother of Maddox Ritch spoke publicly for the first time Tuesday concerning the disappearance of her son, making a plea to the public. "If you were at the park Saturday and saw Maddox, please, urgently please, call the tip line please," she said. "Continue praying for him because I just want my baby home. Maddox is my whole world, my reason for living." Police said Maddox Ritch's father, Ian Ritch, was at Rankin Lake Park helping police retrace his steps and show them again where he was at when the little boy disappeared. Gastonia Police Chief Robert Helton described the time since Maddox Ritch's disappearance as "75 agonizing hours." • Police want to talk to a "professional photographer" at the park who was doing a shoot with children in costumes. • Police would also like to talk to a jogger at the park who has not been identified. "Even if you don't think you can help, please call and let us decide," Helton said. Stop spreading rumors on social media The spreading of rumors about Maddox Ritch takes away from the effort to find him and also proves agonizing for the parents, said FBI special agent Jason Kaplan. 11:25 a.m. When searching for missing children, law enforcement officers across the country often rely on AMBER Alerts to cast a wider net and enlist the public’s assistance in keeping watch. Many have wondered why that tool hasn’t been employed to help find 6-year-old Maddox Ritch, who was reported missing Saturday afternoon at Rankin Lake Park in Gastonia. But officials with the investigation say it’s simply because they are sticking to the strict guidelines for issuing such alerts, which require a child’s disappearance to be tied to an abductor. ““We’re not at the point of reaching the criteria for an Amber Alert,” said Rachel Bagley, a spokeswoman for the city of Gastonia and its police department, during a recent press conference. The AMBER Alert was first put into use in 1996. Notifications about a missing child are distributed to television stations, radio stations and other media, as well as to wireless devices via email and text messages. The system was named for Amber Hagerman, a 9-year-old who was abducted and murdered in Arlington, Texas in 1996. Her first name was also officially formulated into an acronym that stands for ‘America’s Missing: Broadcast Emergency Response.’ Guidelines for issuing AMBER Alerts are very clear, according to the U.S. Department of Justice. And it starts with law enforcement confirming that an abduction has occurred. “This is essential when determining the level of risk to the child,” the Justice Department guidelines state. “To allow activations in the absence of significant information that an abduction has occurred could lead to abuse of the system and ultimately weaken its effectiveness. “At the same time, each case must be appraised on its own merits and a judgment call made quickly,” the guidelines further state. “Law enforcement must understand that a ‘best judgment’ approach, based on the evidence, is appropriate and necessary.” Other guidelines include the child facing a risk of serious bodily injury or death, the child being 17 or younger, and authorities having sufficient descriptive information of the child and the abductor. Authorities investigating the disappearance of Maddox Ritch have said only that they are considering every potential reason for his disappearance. “At this time, we’re looking at all possibilities,” said Gastonia Police Chief Robert Helton. 11 a.m. At least three FBI agents and as many Gaston County Police officers were in the area of the Gaston County Landfill off Philadelphia Church Road, near Dallas. Several Charlotte Mecklenburg Police Department officers have joined them. Throughout the search, officers have looked in dumpsters for Maddox Ritch, so this may just be a part of that process. 10:30 a.m. Were you at Rankin Lake Park on Saturday? Gastonia Police and the FBI want to talk to you. "Hundreds of people were there," said FBI spokeswoman Shelley Lynch. "We need to talk to every one of them." This morning Investigators say their focus remains on finding a 6-year-old autistic boy missing since Saturday, but have now entered into a phase of the investigation an FBI officer described as both investigative and a search for Maddox Ritch. Police are following up on more than 80 leads in trying to locate the little boy reported missing while on an outing at Rankin Lake Park with his father and an unnamed adult. "We're not ruling anything out," said Jason Kaplan, a special agent with the FBI. "We still want to do everything possible to find Maddox and we're hopeful we'll be able to do that." Part of that effort includes help from his parents, Kaplan said. "We worked with his father and mother yesterday and we recorded messages from them," Kaplan said. "And we're playing those messages now so that if he's lost in the woods he'll be able to hear those messages played and we're hoping he'll come to the words of his mother and father. "Both his mother and father have been very cooperative with us as we have tried to find their son." Investigators have also grown tired of false rumors on social media. "Do not spread rumors on social media about the search for Maddox Ritch. Information is being released by our official channels. Don't be responsible for redirecting our efforts away from where they need to be.... we should all unite to #FindMaddox," the FBI wrote on its Twitter page. Rankin Lake Park remains closed as the search continues into its fourth day. You can reach Kevin Ellis at 704-869-1823 or Twitter.com/TheGazetteKevin.<doc-sep>
Maddox Ritch, 6, has autism and does not talk, police said. As the FBI and local authorities desperately search for a 6-year-old boy who went missing in a North Carolina park, his tearful mother is pleading with people to "continue praying for him because I just want my baby home." Maddox Ritch, 6, who has autism and does not talk, went missing Saturday while at the Rankin Lake Park in Gastonia with his family, police said. A $10,000 reward is being offered, authorities said during a press conference Tuesday. "Maddox is my whole world and my reason for living," his mother, Carrie Ritch, said during the press conference. His mother said that Maddox loves the park, bouncy balls and teddy bears,and "his smile is so contagious and his laughter is so precious." "If you were at the park Saturday and saw Maddox ... please, urgently, please call the tip line," Ritch said, crying. "I want my baby back in my arms." As Maddox's mother pleaded for help Tuesday, his father re-traced his route in the park with investigators, authorities said. Maddox has blond hair and blue eyes, weighs 45 pounds and is 4 feet tall, police said. He was wearing black shorts, closed-toe sandals and an orange T-shirt that reads "I am the Man" at the time he went missing, according to police. Hundreds of people were in the park Saturday, police said. Authorities are still looking to speak with people who were there, including a professional photographer taking pictures of a family and a jogger whom police have not been able to identify. Authorities have also checked dozens of dumpsters, searched the park's lake using sonar and divers and scanned the area with helicopters and drones, police said. Authorities have also recorded messages from Maddox's parents and are playing those messages in the woods in the hopes that their voices will persuade him to come out if he's there, FBI Special Agent Jason Kaplan said Monday. Former FBI agent and ABC News contributor Brad Garrett said that the idea of broadcasting Maddox's parents' familiar voices makes perfect sense. Children with special needs "tend to be extremely close to their parents," Garrett told ABC News. "If you have a kid that can't really communicate but his parents talk to him every day ... I completely understand why they would do it." Garrett said the FBI likely recorded the phrases Maddox's parents use with him most often. Anyone who was at Rankin Lake Park on Saturday is asked to call the tip line at 704-869-1075. "We have spoken to many people who were there, but we want to make sure we talk to them all," Gastonia Police Chief Robert Helton said in a statement released by police Monday. "No piece of information is too small. Something you may think is insignificant could be helpful to our case."