The family of a missing 24-year-old Chicago man was on the way to Orange County Wednesday to ask the public for more help, nearly two years after his disappearance.
Nihar Mehta was running a cannabis business in Orange when he was last seen at his warehouse at 1440 Taft Avenue West on June 3, 2023.
The day before, he had called home and talked with his mother, Mehta’s father, Dr. Sandeep Mehta, told City News Service.
“He was fine,” Sandeep Mehta said. “He said he would come home soon. He was not in any kind of distress. He said `I’ll come home soon, mama.’ ”
The family is scheduled to hold a news conference Thursday morning in front of the Orange Police Department.
Investigators in Orange are expected to release a photo of a former co-worker of Nihar Mehta’s in the hopes the public can offer help tracking him down as a person of interest, said Lt. Phil McMullin of the Orange Police Department.
Surveillance video shows Nihar Mehta was at his warehouse June 3, his father said.
The missing man’s car was found abandoned a few miles away from the warehouse in a parking lot on June 23, 2023. Surveillance video shows a man, possibly in his 20s, driving the car and leaving it there on June 12, 2023, with the keys inside and an open window.
“It was in a place where it was likely to be stolen,” Dr. Mehta said.
The doctor said they tracked down one of their son’s employees in August of that year in Joliet, a suburb of Chicago.
“He was in touch with us for a few days,” Dr. Mehta said, adding they have not been able to contact him since.
The employee had family ties to the area. He told the Mehta family that Nihar Mehta had been in some sort of “scuffle” with some other people and the co-worker ran away, the doctor said.
“We don’t believe that guy’s story,” he said.
The family believes there is another man police should question — someone they say ordered Nihar Mehta’s car removed from the warehouse and took possession of his valuable.
Although things look grim for Nihar Mehta, they said, they still hold out hope.
“We’re hoping any day he’ll walk in,” Dr. Mehta said.
The extended family “every day prays to God and do all they can,” he said.
“We’re just waiting and waiting for him to come home and not knowing what happened to him,” he said. “There’s a lot of unknowns here.”
Nihar Mehta has a great deal of friends he grew up with in Chicago, his father said.
“We get random calls from people who are praying for him without us even knowing,” he said.
“I’m sure there are people out there who know what happened,” Dr. Mehta said. “We want people to come forward and help us out.”
Nihar Mehta got involved in the cannabis business to create products that were more healthy and had medicinal value, his father said.
“He was more focused on a healthier version of it,” his father said. “He was trying to create a pure product that wouldn’t harm anyone. He was pretty firm about that.”
Nihar Mehta had a dispute about that principle with an associate, his father said.
The family is offering a $10,000 reward for tips that can help track down the missing man. An anonymous tip line has been set up at 866-591-6950, and there is a website dedicated to helping find him at missinginorangecounty.com.