Brittany Anne Ford just couldn’t catch a break. In April of 2015, Brittany was a 28 -year-old mother of a 6-month baby boy. Her little boy, Deklon, was a smiling baby with bouncing curls.
Brittany and her husband Micardo were living in Conyers, Georgia.
Late one evening in April, Brittany called the police and reported to them that Micardo was beating her and her son. Police arrived and advised her to take the baby and go stay at a hotel. She agreed, but instead, she drove all night up to Ohio, where her mother and brother lived.
After some erratic behavior in Ohio, her mother had her placed under a 72-hour watch in a mental hospital.
Three days later, she was released and went to stay with her brother.
On the morning of May 4th, Brittany’s brother woke up and found both Brittany and Deklon gone. Although he would bizarrely hear from Brittany one more time in a couple of weeks, he would never see Brittany or Deklon again.
Brittany Ford was born on July 24, 1986. Not much is known about her childhood, but all indicators are that she didn’t have the most stable environment growing up.
As an adult, she married Micardo Ford and together they had little Deklon Ford, born on October 4, 2014.
In April 2015- the exact date which isn’t confirmed- Brittany and Micardo fight, and Brittany calls the police. She tells them that Micardo is abusing the baby.
The police respond to their home and advise Brittany that she should take Deklon and go to a hotel for the night. It doesn’t appear that Micardo is arrested that night, which leaves a little confusion as to what happened that night.
So Brittany packs an overnight bag and takes Deklon, telling the police she is heading to a hotel. However, for some reason, she instead makes the ten-hour drive to Columbus, Ohio where her mother and other family members live.
Shortly after she arrives in Columbus, she starts accusing her stepfather of abusing her younger sister. Her behavior became quite erratic, and on April 16th, her family had her admitted to a mental hospital on a 72-hour hold. They believed she was having a mental break of some kind and were quite worried. Baby Deklon would stay with family.
During that time, Micardo drives from Conyers, Georgia up to Columbus to visit Brittany in the hospital. But, Brittany refuses to see him.
On April 19th, Brittany is released from the hospital and goes to stay with her brother. For a couple of weeks, things seem to be normal.
On May 4th, her brother wakes up and finds both Brittany and Deklon missing. He believes she had just gone out to pick up some food. Her purse was missing, as was Deklon’s diaper bag, but the rest of her clothing that she had there was still there. Her brother didn’t think too much about it.
However, when she still wasn’t home that evening, the family started to look around for her. On May 7th, the family went to the Columbus Police Department to report her missing.
It is troublesome that it took three days to report her missing, but this is often the case with missing adults.
Brittany also had recently been having severe enough mental health issues that she had been briefly hospitalized. It seems that would be reason enough to worry and report her missing right away, especially because she had a 6-month baby with her.
To me, this seems to fit the bill for a Silver Alert.
A Silver Alert at risk is activated when an elderly, developmentally, or cognitively impaired person has gone missing and is determined to be at risk. Silver Alerts provide immediate information to the public to aid in the swift recovery of at-risk persons meeting the criteria.
Silver Alert was started in Colorado in 2006. By the end of 2008, 12 other states had implemented a Silver Alert system: Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, Texas and Virginia.
I also don’t see any record of an Amber Alert being issued for Deklon, and Ohio also has Amber Alerts set up statewide. Some have said that is because he was with his mother, but I found this information on the Amber Alert website, indicating he still may have qualified for an Amber Alert:
The law enforcement agency believes that the child is in imminent danger of serious bodily injury or death. There is enough descriptive information about the victim and the abduction for law enforcement to issue an AMBER Alert to assist in the recovery of the child. The abduction is of a child aged 17 years or younger.
If Brittany was unstable, it is possible that Deklon would be in danger. They also had good descriptions of both Brittany and Deklon and knew what type of car Brittany was driving. She was in her white 2007 Nissan Versa with Georgia license plates. They also had the license plate number, so it seems more than enough information to put out an Amber Alert- or a Silver Alert.
Through some type of GPS tracking- the specifics of which are unclear- they believe she went back to Georgia.
May 14th: Things would take a big turn when the family found out that a police officer had helped her with a flat tire somewhere in Indiana. He helped her, and not knowing she was a missing person, sent her on her way. Everything seemed normal.
May 16th: The family would once again get a surprise when Brittany called up her brother and asked her to borrow $10,000. Again, we don’t have specifics- as to why she needed it, if it was just to get on her feet somewhere, or if there was another reason she needed upwards of $10,000.
May 17th: Brittany’s car was found abandoned on the side of Highway 87 near Hardin, Montana.
Google Map Image of Hardin, MontanaPhoto byGoogle Maps
Highway 87 runs east and west, leading into Billings, Montana. Hardin, Montana is about an hour to the east of Billings.
Inside her car were Deklon’s car seat, Brittany’s medication, and all of her personal belongings.
It’s believed at first, that Brittany ran off and just doesn’t want to be found. However, her family is immediately concerned for her and Deklon, especially considering Brittany’s recent struggles.
Brittany had recently been talking about going to Texas, so it was reported that she might be heading there. No one knows of any ties she might have to anyone in Texas.
Brittany’s case doesn’t receive much attention because it is thought that she voluntarily left the area- of her own accord. But you’d think with her fragile mental state and the fact that he was traveling with an infant, there would be some urgency here.
So that brings us to the present day- in which there have been no sightings of Brittany or Deklon, no formal searches organized, and no one has heard from them.
Deklon would now be nine years old. If Brittany and Deklon ran off, it would become harder and harder to hide as Deklon gets older.
Deklon Ford Age-Progression Photo From NCMECPhoto byNCMEC
Their names and photos have been on many mailers, and they are listed as missing persons. Deklon is in the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s Database also.
What do you think happened to Brittany Anne Ford and Deklon Ford?
Micardo has continued to try and search for Brittany and his son, Deklon.
Brittany’s family set up a Facebook page to help her case gain some attention- please go check it out. You can find it titled, Find Brittany and Deklon.
I truly hope the family can have answers soon. It’s been 6 years of not knowing what happened to Brittany and little Deklon and that must be heartbreaking.
Brittany is described as a Caucasian female with brown hair and brown eyes. Brittany has a tattoo of the word “Zion” on the back of her neck. She stands 5’4” tall and weighed 160 pounds at the time of her disappearance.
Deklon is described as a Biracial (African-American/Caucasian) male. Brown hair, brown eyes. He was just 7 months old at the time of his disappearance, and today would be 9½ years old.
Brittany’s family still believes they may be in the areas of Texas or Georgia.
If you have any information as to the whereabouts of Brittany and Deklon Ford, please contact the Columbus Police Department at 614–645–4545.
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