Police in San Francisco have located tech heiress Mint Butterfield, who went missing over a week ago.
Stewart Butterfield, co-founder of Slack, and Caterina Fake, creator of Flickr, are the parents. Butterfield, who is sixteen years old, is their only child.
Fake reported the 16-year-old missing on April 21.
On Saturday night, the Marin County Sheriff’s Office said that they had discovered Butterfield in California, safely accompanied by an adult acquaintance.
According to detectives, Butterfield was seen hanging out with a 26-year-old named Christopher “Kio” Dizefalo.
On Eddy Street in the city’s notoriously dangerous Tenderloin District, US officers found Mint and Dizefalo inside a white van. Mint was discovered unharmed and said that she had willingly escaped from her home in the unincorporated area of Bolinas, even though she was considered “at-risk” because of her history of suicidal threats.
Stewart and Caterina Fake, Mint’s parents, thanked anybody who helped with the investigation and the community for their support.
According to a statement from the Marin County Sheriff’s Office, Butterfield ran away from home willingly and was discovered unharmed.
Following investigators’ questioning, Dizefalo was arrested and lodged in the Marin County Jail on a $50,000 bond.
Mint was deemed “at-risk” by the police earlier this week because of a documented history of suicidal thoughts.
The problematic adolescent, who reportedly has a history of substance abuse issues, is a student at a prestigious Napa Valley boarding school.
San Francisco’s fentanyl epidemic has its epicenter in the Tenderloin, a neighborhood notorious for its squalor, homelessness, criminality, drug trafficking, and prostitution.
Mint’s father, Stewart Butterfield, has a present net worth of $1.6 billion. After Butterfield departed Slack in 2022, Salesforce bought the firm for $28 billion in 2021.
Caterina Fake co-founded the photo-sharing website Flickr with her then-partner Butterfield. Yahoo purchased the picture hosting service from them in 2005.
Fake and Butterfield tied the knot in 2001 and were a couple till the birth of their kid in 2007.
In subsequent years, Butterfield married Jen Rubio, a co-founder of the American firm Away, which specializes in luggage and travel accessories. The couple had two small children together.
Fake is now seeing Jyri Engestrom, co-founder of Jaiku. The two of them have three children together.
