Family holds out hope as FBI joins search for missing Roxborough man

AS THE DAYS-long search effort to find Shane Montgomery - the Roxborough man who went missing after leaving a Manayunk pub early Thanksgiving morning - continued last night, the young man's family found a small glimmer of hope in their quest for answers in his mysterious disappearance.

Philadelphia Police Marine Unit divers, who for hours yesterday dredged the Manayunk Canal in the search for the 21-year-old West Chester University student who was home for Thanksgiving break, came up with nothing.

"We find some relief in the fact that they didn't find him there. It actually has given us a small amount of hope that he wasn't found in the canal," Montgomery's aunt, Marianne Wittman, told the Daily News last night.

There is a path to the canal adjacent to Kildare's, the neighborhood watering hole on Main Street near Conarroe where Montgomery went to meet up with friends Wednesday night. Montgomery left the bar just before 2 a.m. Thursday and hasn't been seen since, sparking a massive search effort for the man, a 2011 graduate of Roman Catholic High School.

Yesterday, an FBI task force joined Philadelphia police in the search for Montgomery, an FBI spokeswoman confirmed.

Wittman said the outpouring of support from hundreds of people - including classmates, Roxborough residents and even those who did not know her nephew - has been overwhelming.

"None of us will ever be able to express our gratitude to family, friends and even strangers who have offered their legs, their prayers, food," said Wittman, whose sister is Montgomery's mother. "There are no words to describe the outpouring of love and support that we've received from our church community, neighborhood and even people that we don't even know."

Wittman said friends and relatives plan to continue distributing fliers and doing anything they can to assist in the search for her nephew in the days ahead, until he is found.

Montgomery, police said, is about 5 feet 11 and thin, with short brown hair and green eyes. He was last seen wearing a gray button-down shirt, gray hooded sweatshirt, blue jeans and black sneakers. He has a Celtic cross tattooed on his shoulder blade.

Wittman said Montgomery's family is devastated, but holding out hope that somebody saw or heard something that night that will give investigators a clue into his whereabouts. She pleaded with anyone who was in the area Wednesday night or Thursday morning to contact police if they have any information, no matter how insignificant it may seem.

"We have to find Shane. People just don't vanish. This was . . . on one of the busiest bar nights in the year, on a street full of bars with young people emptying out, and some people might have [seen] something they don't think is significant or [have] a small piece of information that would at least point us in a direction," Wittman said.

"That's all we're looking for is that one piece of information that will lead us to finding Shane, because we miss him and love him and need him back."

- Staff writer William Bender contributed to this report.