Mystery Forest Boy

The English-speaking teenager arrived in Berlin nine months ago saying he had been living wild and both his parents were dead.

The 'forest boy', who calls himself Ray, in a photo released by Berlin police.

Berlin police have released a photograph of a mystery boy who claims to have spent five years living in a German forest, in the hope of establishing his identity. The teenager, who has been nicknamed the "forest boy", was discovered nine months ago when he turned up at Berlin's town hall carrying a rucksack and tent and saying he had walked for five days to get to Berlin. Calling himself Ray, he said both his parents were dead. The youth said his mother, Doreen, had been killed in a car accident, and that he had lived wild with his father, Ryan, in a German forest until his death last August.

Speaking English, Ray, who is believed to be 17, told authorities that he had buried his father before following his instructions to "walk north until you reach civilization and then ask for help". He does not know where his father died. He says he was born on 20 June 1994, but otherwise knows nothing about his identity. He wears an amulet bearing the initials D and R – believed to be those of his parents – around his neck. While he speaks English, experts who have heard his voice do not think it is his mother tongue.

Police are now hoping their international appeal for information will help to identify him, saying they have doubts about many aspects of his story.
"We have considerable doubts about his version of events," the Berlin police spokesman Thomas Neuendorfer told German media. "Almost a year after he turned up the whole thing is still a complete mystery." Investigators say they find it odd that the boy was so clean when he turned up in Berlin, and the two-man tent he had with him was in relatively good shape. He recalls details such as seeing his father get money "out of a wall" and going shopping in the supermarket Lidl, but very little else.

Investigators immediately alerted Interpol to the boy's case last year. They carried out a DNA profile, which showed Ray most likely comes from Europe, and compared his fingerprints with databases worldwide, but to no avail. Releasing a photo – which was done only after in-depth discussions with the boy – is being seen as something of a last resort. Ray is described as being 1.8 metres (5ft 11in) tall with mousy brown hair and blue eyes. He has three scars on his forehead, three on his chin, and a scar on his right arm.
Ray is living in a care home for young people and can now speak German. But when questioned about further aspects of his life story, the boy simply replies that he cannot remember anything.