LATHAM, N.Y. – “Many times you'd call him on his cell phone and you'd get a ‘Jumbo!’ or a ‘Nashadayma!’” Bill Szostak said.
That is how Josh Szostak answers his phone. Now his father wants nothing more than to hear that voice.
“At Plattsburgh he was the lead radio jockey and he was nicknamed ‘the Stag.’ You couldn't go anywhere without recognizing him and talking to him,” said Szostak. “Never did drugs, since he turned 21 he's been in college, on the weekends they go out and party and he drinks his beer. He likes his Guinness beer. Typical college kid.”
Now pleas to find the Stag flood online sites. His many friends from Plattsburgh, Hudson Valley Community College and Hannaford, where he works, wonder how a guy with such a presence could simply vanish.
It was the afternoon of December 22nd. Josh called his family's house in Latham.
“He told us he was planning to go out,” Szostak said.
Wearing a black hooded sweatshirt with skulls and crossbones on the front, a white t-shirt, baggy jeans and tan sneakers, Josh headed to an Albany bar with enough money to go barhopping with friends around town. From there they went to the Bayou downtown. By midnight, the guys were ready to hit the next bar. Josh made a stop in the men's room.
“His friends said they waited about 45 minutes, they were texting him, searching around, they went in the bathroom,” said Szostak. “Through the surveillance video at the Bayou we could see that Josh bypassed them all, went outside, used the cell, looked up and down the street and couldn't see anybody, decided his friends left and started hoofin’ it towards where his car was.”
On Saturday, Britt Godshalk sat down with Joshua Szostak's father, Bill, who says the family is going through a living hell dealing with their son's disappearance.
But Josh never made it that far. Video proves his car was left untouched outside the Elbo Room. As hours turned into days, search dogs were deployed to follow his scent.
“For some reason the dogs led us down Park Avenue, which is the first cross street in Lincoln Park down by Martin Luther King Monument. If you're a block away from your vehicle, why would you be deterred to go down Park Avenue, unless you happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time,” Szostak said.
A couple days into the search - a twist. A car belonging to the state Department of Environmental Conservation was found damaged and abandoned at the Port of Albany. It had been stolen from a downtown garage, steps from where Josh's cell phone was spotted.
Police initially labeled Josh a suspect in the car theft, but later recanted that theory, saying they had no evidence to support it. Szostak says he's told Josh's prints aren't in or on the car, which is now being combed for DNA evidence. And he says Josh's cell phone provides no leads because the law bars investigators from reading text messages sent to or from it.
Now this former firefighter is facing the fact that passing days with no leads could one day diminish hope.
“We still haven't opened Christmas presents. We still wait for him to come home,” Szostak said. “I'm hoping, but working the type of job that I did for over 20 years, I know reality. I know that if my son were alive I would have heard from him. But I hope to God I'm wrong. You see it on TV. You get a little compassion while you watch the story. To live it, it's living hell.”
As he prays, he speaks of his son, often falling into the past tense.
“Josh would never say goodbye, Josh would end every conversation by saying, ‘peace,’” Szostak recalls. “He was the best son you could have.”
Police tell the Szostaks that they will be going over video from cameras set up along the Capitol to see if the police dogs were correct in the trail they think Joshua took.
Meanwhile, a fund has been set up to help in the search. You can donate at any Pioneer Bank in the Capital Region.