Joshua Alan Retherford was 17 years old when he was last seen in Newport, Tennessee, on September 25, 2022, according to NamUs, which listed his case as Missing Person / NamUs #MP125671. He was identified in public records as a male teenager from Cocke County, Tennessee, and NamUs described his last location as Newport, TN 37821, with the Newport Police Department listed as the investigating agency. The official case information described Joshua as White / Caucasian, approximately 5 feet 4 inches tall, about 125 pounds, with brown hair and brown eyes. Publicly available records did not provide a detailed account of what he was doing before he disappeared, who last saw him, or what he may have been wearing, leaving the first public telling of the case brief and difficult: Joshua was last seen in Newport, and those who knew anything about his whereabouts were asked to help bring answers.
The available public information shows that Joshua's disappearance was treated as a missing juvenile case and circulated through missing-person networks so people in Newport, Cocke County, and the wider Tennessee community could recognize him. The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation's missing-child materials identified him as a 17-year-old from Newport and listed identifying details intended to help the public spot him or provide a useful tip. A separate public listing also repeated the core identifying information: Joshua Retherford, missing age 17, last seen in Newport, Tennessee, on September 25, 2022, with brown hair, brown eyes, a height of 5 feet 4 inches, and a weight of 125 pounds. Those sparse details reflected the painful reality of many missing-person cases, where the public record may contain enough information to identify the missing person but not enough to explain what happened in the hours before contact was lost.
The Newport Police Department was the agency associated with Joshua's missing-person case, and the NamUs entry was created as part of the national system used to document missing persons and make case information available to law enforcement, families, and the public. NamUs describes itself as a national clearinghouse and resource center for missing, unidentified, and unclaimed person cases, and Joshua's entry placed his name, case number, last known location, and date of last contact into that larger public record. The information available online did not include a detailed investigative timeline, a stated reason for his disappearance, a confirmed travel route, or listed clothing and transportation details. Instead, the public-facing record centered on recognition: his name, his age, his physical description, his last known city, and the law enforcement agency connected to the case.
Later public missing-person circulation for Joshua's case was marked resolved by Tennessee Missing, a public missing-persons alert page, though the accessible online information reviewed here did not provide a specific resolution date or an official narrative explaining the circumstances. Because the available case data did not state that Joshua was found alive or deceased, and because the resolution wording available publicly was limited, the safest account is that the public alert was resolved while the exact date and detailed circumstances of that resolution remain unclear from the accessible records. What can be said with care is that Joshua's case began with a 17-year-old boy last seen in Newport, Tennessee, on September 25, 2022; it entered public missing-person systems with the Newport Police Department listed as the investigating agency; it was circulated with his identifying details so the community could help; and it was later publicly marked resolved, leaving the public overview of the case as a brief but meaningful record of a young person's disappearance, the concern that followed, and the eventual resolution of the public alert.
Last Seen: Sep 25, 2022
