'Alarming' Discovery in Search for Missing Texas Woman

Fears are growing for a Texas woman who vanished almost two weeks ago while walking her dog as her beloved pet has been found wandering alone.

Christina Johnson, 27, took the animal for a walk in Houston on March 6 but never came home and her father said she'd never abandon the family dog. Johnson hasn't been seen since, but the dog was found alone on Friday.

According to the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System (NamUs), some 600,000 people go missing in the U.S. every year. Analysis of missing adults over age 21 by Statista, which specializes in data gathering and visualization, revealed that 100,492 men and 62,552 women went missing in 2021, the most up-to-date figure.

Max, a 10-year-old small mixed-breed dog, was found 7.5 miles from the Johnson home. He was rescued by a woman who saw the apparently abandoned animal wandering alone in the rain as a storm moved in. The dog was matted and has been hiding under a table and acting "scared, almost" since he got home, Johnson's father, Emmanuel Johnson, told Click 2 Houston.

Emmanuel Johnson said that as a father, he is suffering an extreme "sense of loss right now" in an interview with local new station KHOU, as he desperately tries to raise awareness about his missing daughter.

"She always has Max with her," he said. "The fact we find Max, but not her, is very alarming. He's rough right now. And he's been out[...]on his own and he's a house dog, never been on his own like that. Something ain't right. Obviously, she's in danger."

He said his daughter had a daily routine of taking her dog and her computer to either the nearby Jack in the Box or the Hackberry Community Center to work.

"She usually comes home before the evening but didn't come back that evening," he said.

The former youth tennis champion recently graduated from Alderson Broaddus University in West Virginia and moved back home as she worked out what to do next, he added.

The Houston Police Department (HPD) is searching for Johnson, while her photo has been circulated on X, formerly Twitter, by the AWARE Foundation.

Christina Johnson is described as 5-foot-4 and 140 pounds. She was last seen wearing a black hoodie, blue denim shorts, pink socks and Crocs shoes. She was carrying a gray backpack and did not have her phone with her.

Newsweek has reached out to HPD by email seeking further information and comment.

Anyone with information about her whereabouts is asked to call HPD's Missing Persons Unit at 832-394-1840 or Crime Stoppers of Houston at 713-222-TIPS.