After picking him up, the driver brought him to the gendarmerie police.
The teenager told French investigators, according to the AP, that he’s spent the past few years traveling with his mother and her father as part of a “spiritual community,” deciding to part ways after he says his mom told him of plans to move to Finland.
“When his mother indicated that she intended to leave for Finland with him,” prosecutor Antoine Leroy said at a news conference, per the outlet, “this young man understood that this journey had to stop.”
Alex walked through the rural part of France for four nights, per the AP, surviving off “different things that he found in fields or gardens,” according to prosecutors, before he was picked up and led to safety.
Shortly after his return, Alex’s grandmother, Susan Caruana, expressed her joy at learning of his fate.
“I cannot begin to express my relief and happiness that Alex has been found safe and well,” she said in a statement obtained by AP. “It was so good to hear his voice and see his face again.”
E! News has reached out to Greater Manchester Police for additional updates and has not heard back.
(E! and NBC News are part of the NBCUniversal family.)
