Pasco Sheriff's deputies are searching for 16-year-old Channing Stikeleather, who was last seen around 6:10 a.m. Friday in the Cypress Bay Parkway area of Land O' Lakes. Stikeleather is described as 5 feet 5 inches tall and around 115 pounds, with brown hair and brown eyes, and was last wearing a green button-up shirt, jeans, and tan boots. Deputies say the teen may be carrying a backpack.
According to a post from the Pasco Sheriff, deputies are treating Stikeleather's disappearance as a missing or runaway case and are asking the public for help locating the teen. The Cypress Bay Parkway area sits within the Asbel Creek master-planned subdivision, a residential single-family housing community in central Pasco County, according to Pascopa.com. Anyone with information is asked to call the Pasco Sheriff's Office non-emergency line at 727-847-8102, option 7, or submit a tip online at pascosheriff.com/tips.
Pasco Sheriff’s deputies are currently searching for Channing Stikeleather, a missing/runaway 16-year-old. Stikeleather is 5’5”, around 115 lbs., with brown hair, and brown eyes. Stikeleather was last seen on Sept. 11, around 6:10 a.m., in the Cypress Bay Pkwy. area of Land O’… pic.twitter.com/1hqpVyhJ0U
— Pasco Sheriff (@PascoSheriff) September 12, 2026
Why There's No Statewide Alert
Despite the urgency of any missing-child case, Florida law draws a sharp line between local searches and statewide alerts. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement reserves AMBER Alerts and Missing Child Alerts for cases involving confirmed abductions or active evidence of imminent death or serious bodily injury, which is why the search for Stikeleather is being handled through local tip lines and public bulletins rather than a broadcast alert.
That doesn't mean deputies have discretion to slow-walk the case. Florida Statute § 937.021 bars law enforcement from imposing any waiting period before accepting a missing child report and requires that case details be entered into state and national databases within two hours of receiving credible information. A separate statute, § 937.0201, classifies any missing person under 18 as both a missing child and a missing endangered person, guaranteeing full investigative resources regardless of whether the teen is believed to have left home voluntarily.
A Pattern of Runaway Cases Across Pasco County
Stikeleather's disappearance is the latest in a string of missing-teen cases the Pasco Sheriff's Office has worked in recent weeks. Hoodline reported Thursday that deputies were searching for Isaiah Alers, a 17-year-old from Wesley Chapel who went missing Tuesday afternoon, and for 15-year-old Yessenia Castillo, who vanished again from the same Port Richey neighborhood where she'd previously disappeared. Earlier cases this month and last include 17-year-old Tristen Coleman, who vanished near Ridge Crest Drive at 3 a.m., 17-year-old Cameron Jinks, last seen near Thames Place in Wesley Chapel, and 14-year-old Serenity Bell, who went missing in Wesley Chapel in August.
Nationally, the vast majority of missing-child reports involve runaways rather than stranger abductions. Endangered runaways accounted for more than 90% of the 32,167 missing-child cases the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children supported in 2025, per the organization's own data. Still, the same organization has found that roughly 1 in 7 endangered runaways reported to NCMEC in 2025 were likely victims of child sex trafficking, underscoring the risks facing teens who are away from their guardians even briefly.
State Resources Back Local Search Efforts
Local deputies aren't working alone. The Florida Department of Law Enforcement operates the Missing Endangered Persons Information Clearinghouse, known as MEPIC, a 24/7 unit that provides analytical support to local agencies and runs the state's missing children tip line. NCMEC also plays a role in Florida cases broadly, having assisted with 2,646 missing child cases originating in the state in 2023 and reporting 2,740 statewide case resolutions that same year.
The Pasco Sheriff's Office has also adjusted how it handles public tips in recent years. The agency disabled public comments on its social media missing-person announcements in 2022, according to the Tampa Bay Times, in order to prevent time-sensitive leads from getting buried in online replies and to direct tipsters straight to dispatchers instead. That policy remains the framework for how the office is soliciting help in Stikeleather's case, funneling all leads through its non-emergency line and online tip form rather than social media comment threads.
As of Friday, deputies have not released additional details about the circumstances surrounding Stikeleather's early-morning disappearance. Anyone with information about the teen's whereabouts is urged to contact the Pasco Sheriff's Office.
