PATROL LOCATES MISSING.

Byline: Josh Kleinbaum Staff Writer

SYLMAR - Greg Fry was sleeping soundly at 12:03 a.m. last Tuesday when his pager went off, summoning him to a staging area at Olive View Medical Center.

Just 45 minutes later, he and other members of the 30-man California Emergency Mobile Patrol deployed to search for Marcos Torres, a 76-year-old Alzheimer's patient who had wandered away from the hospital's emergency room at 3 p.m.

And just 45 minutes after that, the CEMP team found Torres huddled in a fetal position in the underbrush and suffering from the early stages of hypothermia.

``We got lucky,'' Fry said. ``Once the sun went down, he stayed put and hunkered down for the night.''

Composed of volunteers and funded by donations, CEMP members step in to help police departments and other local agencies when they need a little more manpower.

Their specialty is finding missing people, as demonstrated by their skill in finding Torres, who was visiting from Mexico when he went to the emergency room complaining of chest pain.

A clinical psychologist on the team helps members get into the mind of the missing person. In Torres' case, members knew that an elderly Alzheimer's patient would walk with the wind at his back, not in his face.

Every team member goes through 60 days of training, with refresher sessions every month. Some members have taken extensive courses on finding missing people.

Although the team can be deployed anywhere in Los Angeles, it is based out of the Los Angeles Police Department's Devonshire station in Northridge and focuses on activities in the San Fernando Valley.

``They're great at what they do,'' LAPD Cmdr. Kirk Albanese said. ``They're volunteers, they're working people, and we call them at one in the morning and they're on their way. It's amazing.''

Josh Kleinbaum, [phone]

josh.kleinbaum(at)dailynews.com