Troubled cop traced to Pike from New York: 9/11 sparked depression



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By Michele McPhee
Boston Herald Police Bureau Chief
Saturday, April 28, 2007 - Updated: 10:46 AM EST

A suicidal detective from Brooklyn, New York who spent months digging in the rubble at Ground Zero for the remains of fellow cops killed in the 9/11 terrorist attacks has mysteriously vanished and investigators are desperately searching for him in Massachusetts, the Herald has learned.

Frank “Ender” Guclen, 33, a New Jersey Port Authority detective who was assigned to the elite Joint Terrorist Task Force, was reported missing by his parents in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, on Tuesday, hours after he told his mother: “I hope my son remembers me,” an NYPD source said yesterday.

A day later, his E-Z Pass toll transponder recorded Guclen passing through the Millbury Exit 11 toll on the Mass Pike. Yesterday, he apparently used his credit card to purchase underwear and socks at a nearby Target store, a law enforcement source said.

A missing person’s poster released by the Port Authority Police Department yesterday said that Guclen has a “history of depression and is suicidal.”

Yesterday, a fellow cop said Guclen had developed mental health problems related to 9/11.

In the harrowing days after the World Trade Center towers collapsed, Guclen was assigned to what was referred to as “The Pile,” where cops and firefighters spent months digging through 16 acres of twisted steel and debris with small, hand-held spades looking for the remains of “MOS” - or missing “Members of Service.”

There were 343 FDNY firefighters; 23 NYPD cops; and 37 Port Authority officers killed responding to the deadliest terrorist attack on American soil.

On Sept. 26, 2001, Guclen was interviewed by the New Jersey Star Ledger after he spent a night pouring through the rubble. At the time, there were thousands of people still missing in the debris. “You ever see the movie ‘Groundhog Day’? It’s just like that. You do the same thing over and over, and it never changes,” Guclen said.

A Port Authority spokesman said that Guclen had been out on a stress-related medical leave for about a year before he disappeared, but declined to be more specific. Before that, Guclen, who joined the Port Authority police in 1999, was assigned to the Joint Terrorist Task Force responsible for investigating and preventing terrorist attacks.

“We are very concerned about Frank. We are working closely with the NYPD to try to find him,” said PAPD spokesman Mark Lavorgna.

Lavorgna said that the department had “a number of officers who experienced debilitating mental health problems due to the traumatic events of 9/11.”

In 2002, FDNY firefighter Gary Celentani, 33, placed pictures of firefighter and cop friends who died on 9/11 in the basement of his home, set them up in a shrine and shot himself. A year later, an FDNY medic, Daniel Stewart, 27, who spent months looking for corpses at Ground Zero, hung himself.

Guclen is 5 feet, 7 inches tall, weighs 270 pounds and has hazel eyes, short black hair and olive skin. He speaks fluent Turkish and has a flag from that country tattooed on his arm. He is driving a gray 2000 Hyundai Accent with New York plate BXK1005.

Anyone with information about his whereabouts is asked to call 973-961-6300.