New York Mom Seeks Answers After Son Found Dead in School Chimney
Matthew Collado's remains were discovered in a Queens public school chimney months after he was reported missing.
A New York mother is seeking answers after her 29-year-old son was found dead in the chimney of a public school earlier this year. Matthew Collado was reported missing by his family on May 13, after he failed to appear for Mother's Day celebrations with his mother, Sophia Wood.
Wood last communicated with her son via text on Mother's Day, May 10, when he did not call her as expected. She recalled sending a text expressing annoyance, but ultimately decided to trust he was fine. A subsequent search of Collado's Queens apartment revealed his wallet and phone, but no sign of him. Surveillance footage showed Collado leaving his apartment building shortly after 3 a.m. on May 9, the last confirmed sighting.
"Why are you leaving the house at that time? What are you doing? What's going on?" Wood wondered.
In late June, weeks after Collado was reported missing, a pest control worker investigating a foul odor at PS 113 in Queens made a grim discovery. The worker found human remains inside the school's chimney. It was later confirmed through dental records and physical descriptions that the remains belonged to Matthew Collado.
"They said the dental records along with the pictures and the way I described him confirmed that it was Matthew that they found in the chimney," Wood told CBS. She expressed shock and disbelief, stating, "It was hard because, like, why? Like, how, you know? How could this be him? This is not the life I knew that my son lived."
According to his mother, Collado was afraid of heights and disliked fire and smoke, making the circumstances of his death particularly baffling. "It just all seems so uncharacteristic. It just all seems so strange," she said.
Collado, who was raised in East Elmhurst and aspired to be a rapper under the stage name AK Nash, had planned to start a new job as a residential aide at a nonprofit organization. The investigation into his death is ongoing, and the medical examiner's office has yet to determine the official cause and manner of his death.
Wood hopes that anyone with information will come forward to help unravel the mystery surrounding her son's final moments. "I feel like I'm being bamboozled. I feel like it's a freaking nightmare. It's a bad trick," she said.