Man and child found dead in Gainesville during search for missing Oklahoma father and 4-year-old

A Gainesville police investigator found a man and a child dead in the city on Oct. 14, the department said. The investigator was looking for a father and his 4-year-old child reported missing from Norman, Okla. Police did not name the two who died. Positive identification is left to the medical examiner, and police gave no cause of death.

In its written release, the department called the case an ongoing investigation and said the Texas Rangers were helping. The release did not say whether the search for the missing pair had ended. It also did not say whether the AMBER Alert issued for the child was over.

Oklahoma authorities were searching for Caleb Furley, 25, and his child, Andres Furley, who also goes by Harry. The state named them in an endangered-missing advisory posted Oct. 13. The advisory said the child was last seen with Caleb Furley at about 7 p.m. Oct. 11. Norman police took the missing-person report the next day.

The Oklahoma Highway Patrol issued an AMBER Alert for Norman police on Oct. 14. The alert said Furley missed an exchange with the child's mother and was wanted on a parental-kidnapping warrant.

The Gainesville release also describes a report from Oct. 12 of suspicious contact involving a man and a child. Officers searched with a drone and did not find them. According to the department, investigators then went through surveillance video from a business, and the bodies were found after that review.

WSMV, a television station in Nashville, Tenn., ran a video report on the discovery Oct. 15.

Under Oklahoma's published guidelines, officials can issue an AMBER Alert only when they reasonably believe a child was abducted and faces imminent danger of serious injury or death. They also need enough description to help the public find the child.

The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children reviewed the AMBER Alert cases of 2025 and set aside hoaxes and unfounded reports. It classified more than half of the remaining cases as family abductions. Nearly half of the children whose ages were known were younger than 5. The same report found that Texas issued more alerts that year than any other state. Oklahoma issued one.

Texas DPS says the alert system began in the Dallas-Fort Worth area after 9-year-old Amber Hagerman was abducted and killed in Arlington in 1996. Seven-year-old Athena Strand was kidnapped and killed in nearby Wise County in 2022. After her death, a 2023 Texas law let local police chiefs ask for an alert before the usual criteria are verified. That alert can cover a 100-mile radius and adjacent counties, according to Texas DPS.

Texas DPS also cautions that an alert marked found or discontinued is only a preliminary status. An alert can end while a person is still missing, and only the investigating agency can confirm what happened.

_Editor's note: Everyone charged with a crime is presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty in a court of law._