Police and family are urgently asking for help locating a Marine vet missing for two weeks.
On April 1, the sheriff’s office in Jackson County, Michigan, issued a missing person alert for Geoffrey Michael Bowen, who was last seen by his wife on March 31 at his home in Brooklyn, Michigan.
"[Bowen] is 5 feet 10 inches, 175 pounds with short brown hair and a short brown beard," police said in the alert. "He was last seen driving a 1989 Ford Bronco dark blue in color with white stripes. It has a Michigan Marine veteran license plate with the registration of OLCC7."
Bowen joined the Marines as a rifleman in December 2005. He deployed to Iraq twice — once in 2007 and again in 2008. He left the service and EAS’d as a corporal in December 2009, according to Marine Corps officials. His brother said he served with 2nd Battalion, 6th Marines. He deployed twice to Iraq: from March to Sept. 2007 and from August 2008 to January 2009.
Bowen had recently been struggling with post-traumatic stress Disorder and left a suicide note on his mother’s car the next morning in Saline, Michigan, his brother Kenneth Bowen said.
Geoffrey Michael Bowen was last seen by his wife on March 31 at his home in Brooklyn, Michigan.
Photo Credit: Courtesy Kenneth Bowen
"He loved his fellow Marines and he was proud to have served," Kenneth Bowen said. "He was tough."
Also a Marine, Kenneth Bowen was wounded in Afghanistan in 2009. Geoffrey arranged to be reassigned to Texas to be his caregiver, Kenneth said.
"He helped bandage me every morning," he said. "Geoff isn't always the most outgoing in social settings, but he makes his friends laugh and loves his family. He loves hunting and fishing, which is why we have been putting up a lot of flyers in rural Michigan."
Anyone with information which might help locate Bowen is asked to call the Jackson County sheriff's office at (517) 768-7901 or 911.
The family is also offering a $10,000 award for help in finding the missing Marine vet Marine.
Matthew L. Schehl covers training and education, recruiting, West Coast Marines, MARSOC, and operations in Europe, Africa and the Middle East for Marine Corps Times. He can be reached at mschehl@marinecorpstimes.com.
