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Missing N.Y. cleric found at strip club
Pastor, the focus of a nationwide search, was located in Riverside.
Saturday, March 29, 2008
RIVERSIDE — A pastor reported missing after he left his Lewiston, N.Y., home on Wednesday to go to Best Buy was found in a Riverside strip club 422 miles away on Friday, March 28.
A Riverside officer patrolling the lot at K.C. Lounge, 4766 Airway Road, at about 12:40 a.m. noticed an out-of-state license plate, according to reports. The officer discovered the owner, Craig S. Rhodenizer, 46, was listed as a missing and possibly endangered, and sought by the Niagara County Sheriff's Department and the FBI.
Lyndonville Pastor Craig Rhodenizer, missing since Wednesday, was found early Friday morning, hundreds of miles away, inside a strip club in Riverside, Ohio which is just outside of Dayton.Rhodenizer, the pastor of St. John's Lutheran Church in Lyndonville, N.Y., told his wife he was going to get his computer fixed at Best Buy on Wednesday.
Rhodenizer was coherent when police approached him.
"He initially was very easy to talk to," Detective Matt Sturgeon said. "When he started to realize there was a nationwide search and this was serious, there was an instantaneous switch and he became extremely disoriented and confused."
He said he didn't know why he came to Riverside nor did he know anyone here. He then asked about his wife and son and said he didn't know what day it was. When medics asked if he felt any pain, he said he felt "emotionally guilty."
Sturgeon said Rhodenizer was taken to Grandview Hospital for a 48-hour psychiatric evaluation.
The report said Rhodenizer was in the club for two hours and drank three or four beers. One dancer said he paid for three or four private dances. She claimed he became verbally aggressive when he offered to pay her to return to his motel room with him and she refused.
She also said he wouldn't tell her where he was from, but did say he "hadn't been in a strip club for over 20 years and it was about time he was in one again."
Police contacted Rhodenizer's wife, Susan, and the Niagara County Sheriff's Department. The department asked Riverside officers to impound Rhodenizer's Toyota Camry and take possession of a computer, which was found with a bottle of Bacardi and an empty gallon bottle of gin.
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-2235 or vwarren@DaytonDailyNews.com.
