NYC marathoner stopped mid-race to help disabled man, unaware he’d been missing since Halloween
Fifty-five-year-old Giacomo 'Jack' Campione was dressed in a Halloween costume when he went out with his group home housemates.
When loved ones go missing, panic ensues alongside efforts to find them and bring them to safety. When Giselle Campione noticed that her brother Giacomo "Jack" Campione, who suffers from intellectual disabilities, went missing, she went looking for him tirelessly, but to no avail. Until an angel in the form of a marathoner helped him reunite with his family on November 2, 2025.
As per CBS, fifty-five-year-old Giacomo "Jack" Campione was dressed in a Halloween costume when he went out with his group home housemates. However, the Halloween crowd made him get swept up in Flushing, Queens, as he exited the Q13 bus in New York. Panicked by his disappearance, his family soon began a search operation. Campione's sister, Giselle Campione, revealed that he slept on the sidewalk and survived on Halloween treats by saying "trick-or-treat" to people. "We had a group of people out on the streets looking for him. We made flyers. If it wasn't for the community, I don't know if Jack would be here right now," said Giselle in tears.
While the family was frantically searching for Jack, their prayers were answered on the third day. The New York City Marathon was passing through Queens Plaza, where one of the runners saw Jack fall on his face. They immediately called the cops for help and helped him reunite with his family. Erin Daly-Spano, who works as a special advocate at Hope Alive 845 for missing disabled people, located Jack at the hospital after he fell. Although the family was unable to find the good Samaritan, they expressed their gratitude to the kind stranger. "Whoever you are, thank you, thank you, thank you... You saved someone's life, honestly," Giselle Campione said.
The family was worried Jack would be mistaken for a homeless or drunk person when he traversed more than seven miles away from their home in Long Island. "It's New York. We see a lot of stuff in New York," Giselle Campione said. "Thank you, New York, for helping my brother." In a study authored by Antonio Miguel-Cruz, Hector Perez, Yoojin Choi, Emily Rutledge, Christine Daum, and Lili Liu, researchers analyzed the prevalence of 'missing' incidents due to critical wandering among older people. As per the research, 22% of cases were repeat incidents, showing a pattern of recurring wandering behavior. Additionally, around 90% of individuals were found safely, though 9% experienced harm and 0.2% resulted in death. Thankfully, Jack was lucky to have been found by the kind stranger who brought him back to safety.
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