THE mother of a 12-year-old boy with autism who vanished after bolting from his home near Barcelona during violent storms has insisted that someone is holding him against his will.
Rami has not been seen since October 4, when severe storms and heavy rain battered Granollers, a town in the Valles Oriental county just north of the Catalan capital.
Catalan firefighters have since been undertaking a tireless 10-day search for the boy in the weeds and ravines connected to the Besos river system.
According to a friend of his mother, the sheer scale of the storm terrified the boy so badly that he ran out into the pouring rain.
With no trace of him more than a week later, his mother, Faouzia Benouizi, told Spanish broadcaster Antena 3 that she still holds out hope of finding her son alive.
“I think my son is locked up somewhere with someone, I am sure of it, that is what my heart tells me,” she said.
Relatives fear that Rami’s autism made him an easy target for a stranger once he was out on the streets alone in the dark and rain.
His uncle, Youssef Benouizi, said the family believes someone may have pulled over and picked him up in a vehicle after he fled the house.
“We think he got into a car because he is a vulnerable child and anyone who says to him ‘get in’, he is going to get in,” he said.
Although only 12, Rami is tall and heavily built for his age at 1.73 metres, with a dark complexion and short curly hair.
He was wearing only a turquoise T-shirt and orange sports shorts when he ran out into the storm, and the Mossos d’Esquadra, Catalunya’s regional police force, have warned that he could be disorientated.
Officers and the Bombers de la Generalitat, the regional fire and rescue service, have been checking urban areas and specific locations flagged by the family.
At the same time, emergency crews have repeatedly scoured the area around a hotel where Rami was reportedly seen for the last time.
Despite the family’s conviction that he was taken in by someone, around 50 firefighters have been deployed daily across a 77 sq km search zone focusing on rivers and inland water basins swollen by the October 4 floods.
Specialists from the fire service’s mountain, underwater and dog-handling rescue units, backed by drones and forestry teams, have swept an 18km stretch of the Besos river from Sant Fost de Campsentelles all the way to its mouth at the Mediterranean, including 6km of dense riverbank vegetation.
Search teams have also combed the Valldoriolf stream and the point where the Mogent, Congost and Besos rivers meet down to Montmelo, while continuing upstream from Montcada alongside local volunteers.
Meanwhile, the Mossos d’Esquadra have extended the search along the coastline from the mouth of the Besos river towards Badalona and Barcelona city, reaching 1.85km out to sea.
Police have urged anyone with information on Rami’s whereabouts to call the 112 emergency line immediately.
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