Civilian Service Award: Camas woman reunites family

It didn’t matter that it was close to 11 p.m. or that she was preparing for bed. Ross needed to find out if the man was still there.

“We live very close to the lake, so it was half an hour back and forth just checking on it, and I didn’t lose anything by checking,” she said. “It was my conscience, the little voice in my head, saying, ‘Could I do something better?’ ”

Ross’ actions that night in late July 2024 helped reunite Carlos Granados with his family and earned Ross the Camas Police Department’s 2025 Civilian Service Award.

The Camas resident said she wasn’t seeking attention or awards but was, as she put it, simply “in the right place at the right time.”

“I’m not a hero here,” Ross said.

Granados’ older sister, Vilma Granados, who lives with him, and Camas Police Chief Tina Jones disagree. They both said that not many people would’ve done what Ross did that night.

“Thinking about it gives me chills because she saved a life by paying attention and listening to her instincts,” Jones said of Ross. “This, to me, is a great example of a community member having the awareness to take action when something felt ‘off’ to increase public safety. We need more of that.”

Fruitless searches

Carlos Granados, 54, told his sister that he needed some fresh air before leaving their house on 164th Avenue in Vancouver around 11 a.m. on July 26, 2024.

Vilma said Carlos suffers from memory issues, so she normally doesn’t let him go out on his own.

“But I was working,” Vilma Granados said, “and he is an adult, and he has a right.”

When Carlos didn’t return by 6 p.m., Vilma became alarmed and went out to look for him.

“I’m driving around, going in circles,” she recalled. “We were looking in parks, places that we know he goes to. We went down to the homeless camps. Nothing.”

Carlos’ family and friends expanded their hunt the next day, searching downtown Portland, downtown Vancouver, Ridgefield and Camas’ Lacamas Lake area, but found no sign of the missing Vancouver man.

By then, Vilma said, she was “in panic mode.” She blamed herself for letting Carlos leave the house by himself and worried that her brother was unable to take his medications.

Family members submitted Carlos’ photo and information to the Clark County missing persons website and called the Vancouver Police Department, but Vilma was still terrified.

“I felt hopeless, to be honest, because they said what normally happens is (that a missing person) is found after being encountered in a situation of disturbing others,” Vilma said. “When they said that, I knew that one person could not dedicate themselves to search, and I felt like, ‘Oh, my God, you’re not really doing anything, so let me do it again.’ ”

Vilma went out again in search of her brother. She concluded at Heritage Park in Camas on July 28, and said she was starting to lose hope. Then she received a phone call that would change everything.

‘He didn’t look like a hiker’

The day before seeing the missing person post on Facebook, Luba Ross and her husband, Ian Ross, were walking their dogs, Bailey and Laika, around Round Lake when they noticed a man sitting on a bench.

“He didn’t look like a hiker,” Luba Ross said. “But it’s a very easy walk to that spot on the lake … so you don’t need to be physically fit to get there. On that first day, I didn’t think anything was unusual. It didn’t stand out.”

The Rosses don’t usually walk their dogs two days in a row, but on July 28, 2024, they decided to return to Round Lake for another stroll. They were surprised to see the same man, wearing the same clothes and sitting on the same bench, from the day before.

“It stood out a little bit more,” Luba said. “I made a mental note of that because it was kind of weird that he was there two days in a row.”

The story may have ended there if Luba hadn’t noticed a post by a public safety scanner group on Facebook while she was, in her words, “doomscrolling” later that evening.

When she had passed by the man on the bench earlier that day, Luba didn’t pay too much attention to his face, but the clothing described in the missing person post rang a bell.

“The description of the clothes was kind of similar,” Luba said. “Then, when my husband got out of the shower, I showed him the picture, and he was like, ‘That’s him.’ ”

The couple got dressed, grabbed some headlamps and returned to Round Lake around 11 p.m. that night. To their surprise, they found the man still sitting on the bench.

Ian called the Camas Police Department while Luba made contact with Carlos Granados’ niece through Facebook. Camas police officers arrived on the scene about 10 minutes later, followed shortly by emergency medical workers with the Camas-Washougal Fire Department. The first responders assessed Carlos Granados’ condition, loaded him onto a gurney and transported him to PeaceHealth Southwest Medical Center.

“He said he had been there for two days and had not had anything to eat or drink,” Camas police Officer Brian Salwasser stated in his case report. “He said he was weak and could not walk out on his own power.”

‘Above and beyond’

After a three-hour stay at the Vancouver hospital, where he was treated for dehydration, Carlos Granados returned home. Later, Vilma Granados tried to talk to her brother about that fateful day. She asked which way he had walked. She asked him how he got to Round Lake. She asked him if he had eaten or drunk anything during those two days. But to every question, she received the same answer: “I don’t know.”

“The only thing he said is that he fell into water,” Vilma Granados said. “Maybe he was sleeping. I don’t know.”

She is convinced that her brother hiked to Round Lake that day. She said he used to walk from his house to Round Lake, a journey of about 7 miles, when he was younger.

“He knew the way,” Vilma said.

When she asked Carlos why he didn’t walk back, he told Vilma his legs were “wiggly” and he couldn’t stand up.

Nearly one year later, Vilma said Carlos has “good and not-so-good days,” and doesn’t like to go outside too often.

“When he does, I say, ‘Let’s go together,’” Vilma said.

She describes Luba Ross as her angel.

“What she did was way above and beyond,” Vilma said. “I believe that God selected her to help me. She lifted a heavy weight from my shoulders. The words ‘thank you’ are not enough.”

Doug Flanagan: 360-735-4669; doug.flanagan@columbian.com