Unhappy with UK police’s search efforts for missing husband wife request a decommissioned ambulance as donation

IPSWICH July 20: Dr Ramaswamy Jayaram, a 56-year-old Malayalee doctor from Ipswich who had been missing since June 30th, was found dead July 3, though the exact cause of death remains unknown.

Dr Jayaram, married to Catherine and father to one daughter, was last seen leaving his home at 5:45 a.m. on Sunday, June 30th. Born in Thrissur, his disappearance led to extensive search efforts by family friends, members of the public, Suffolk Lowland Search and Rescue, and HM Coastguard. The community came together in an outpouring of support, with many volunteering to help locate the esteemed doctor.

In a statement, Suffolk police said, “A man has been found deceased in woodland in the Gainsborough area of Ipswich. A member of the public called police at 9:25 a.m. this morning, Wednesday, July 3, reporting that they had found a body in Braziers Wood. Although the deceased is yet to be formally identified, the authorities believe it is missing 56-year-old Ramaswamy Jayaram.”

Dr Jayaram’s funeral was held on 15th Jul 2024 at the Ipswich Crematorium Cemetery Lane Ipswich IP4 2TQ.

Now Late Dr Jayaram’s wife Catherine has come out with a Facebook post requesting for a donation of a decommissioned ambulance. Below is the Facebook post.

Morning everyone. Firstly a huge thank you for everyone’s love and support over the past few weeks. I now have a favour to ask, which involves reading and sharing this post.

As you all know my husband Ramaswamy Jayaram went missing on the 30th June and was discovered by my friends who had gone searching for him on 3rd July.

The police had asked search and rescue and coastguard to help with the search. On 1st July I reached out to Darren Debenham he has highly trained dogs who work on tracking individuals.

He also trains dogs for security, drug searches and has an extensive knowledge of search and rescue, as well as working with other police forces.

He kindly agreed to help for free and came to our house to collect an item of Jay’s clothing. At this point the police had not asked to do this for their dogs, and in fact never did, despite later saying they had the same type of dogs.

Darren’s dog blitz picked up Jay’s scent in an area that had been searched and demonstrated that Jay had been pacing in that area. This was in the early hours of 2nd July. The police were informed and attended.

I spoke to the sergeant and told him I wanted Darren involved in the search, to work alongside search and rescue. Darren was willing to give his time for free to assist. The sergeant agreed however said the decision lay with the search and rescue team.

Unfortunately egos came into play and our requests to allow Darren to assist were repeatedly rejected for reasons ranging from “his dog will distract our dogs” yet the area was never closed to the public and there seemed to be no issue with other dogs there to “we want a sterile search field” but yet again the public were never prevented from entering.

The reality is that had Darren been allowed to join Jay would have been found sooner. I’m not naive enough to think the outcome might not have been the same however he would have been located quicker.

When someone is in mental distress and there are concerns for health every minute is vital. It is a medical emergency.

Following on from this Darren has been asked to start a specialist dog unit which will be free and manned by volunteers using his specialist dogs.

The hope is that Suffolk Constabulary Official Page will call them in alongside other search and rescue teams. In order to start this Darren would like to try and obtain a square shaped ambulance like the one pictured.

He will turn it into a mobile unit to carry the dogs and equipment. If there is anyone who knows of a decommissioned ambulance like this that can be donated please get in touch.

We are NOT asking for money, just the donation of the vehicle. Please share. Jay dedicated 20 years of his life to our NHS as a doctor helping people in mental distress. His legacy will continue to help others. Thank you for reading.