Rosie O’Donnell on Tuesday issued a plea for help in finding her daughter, Chelsea O’Donnell, who ran away from home and was last seen by her family on August 11, a family spokeswoman said.
The 17-year-old left home with her 6-month-old therapy dog, a black terrier named Bear, O’Donnell said in a statement on her website. Chelsea had stopped taking medication for an undisclosed mental illness and “is in need of medical attention,” the statement said.
“Chelsea, like millions of people, lives with mental illness,” family spokeswoman Cindi Berger said. “It has been a difficult road for Chelsea and her family, and they just want her back safe.”
O’Donnell also shared the information from her social media accounts with pictures of her daughter with her dog. The teen was last seen wearing a black hooded sweatshirt, dark ripped blue jeans, gray Converse sneakers and a black backpack. She had no money, according to Berger.
The family contacted South Nyack Police in upstate New York on Sunday to report that Chelsea had not returned home, Sgt. Daniel Wilson said.
The family told police they had not seen her since August 11, but they had been in contact with her, Wilson said. Berger, however, denied that the family had been in contact with Chelsea since they’d seen her.
Wilson said Chelsea used an unknown cell phone to contact her family between August 11 and Sunday. The teenager does not have her own phone or computer with her, he said.
Police have not officially classified Chelsea as “missing,” but the investigation continues, he said. Police have no information about the dog or the medication that O’Donnell referred to in her statement.
They do not believe that Chelsea is in danger, Wilson said.
