Worried mom travels to NYC from Detroit in desperate search for tattoo artist son missing for 3 months

A concerned mother was set to drive to New York City from Detroit Monday to try to find her tattoo artist son who vanished on his way home from work back in September.

Mom Kellie Tolstoy is desperately hoping for the best in the three-monthlong search for her 26-year-old son, Drexyll Tolstoy, who disappeared after he left Black Fish Tattoo on W. 32nd St. near Herald Square.

“Our hope by coming to New York is that we will either be able to somehow get lucky and find him or bring attention to people in the area to have them look out for him,” Kellie Tolstoy said.

Cops officially reported that Tolstoy was missing on Sept. 26. He was last seen a day earlier at about 9:25 p.m. near W. 32nd St. and Sixth Ave., police said. The NYPD rereleased its request for the public’s help in finding him on Nov. 16.

Tolstoy had been living in the city for the past six years. He left work about 6 p.m. — with a security camera taking a picture of him then.

His girlfriend of 10 years, Kristian Gonzalez, 27, saw that he didn’t come to work on Sept. 26 and reported him missing that night.

“He told me that he was at the movies around 9 or so, and that was the last I heard of him,” she said. “He said he was going to go see ‘Bullet Train.’”

But cops said there was no showing of that movie at that time.

Gonzalez became very concerned when he didn’t appear at work. “It’s not the first time he hadn’t come home before. He’s pretty nomadic. He goes out and he does his thing, but he always seems to manage to come back,” she said.

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The mom said she last spoke to her son on Sept. 25 about 9:30 p.m.

He’d been having some difficulties lately both with his relationship and with some depression issues through COVID, she said.

Drexyll had been on mood medication for about five years, but the type of meds he was on had been changed about a week earlier, his mother said.

“I was talking to him trying to make sure he was doing OK with his new meds,” she said. “I was just trying to feel around the edges to see how he felt and if he was doing OK.”

She described him as “gentle and soft-spoken.” “He’s a great tattoo artist,” she said. “He’s not an extrovert, but he’s thoughtful and kind.”

Tolstoy decorated himself with a range of tattoos, including an excerpt from a letter his mom sent him which says, “I’m so proud of you. I love you so much.”

He was born in Naples, Italy, and grew up in Detroit. His parents are both Gulf War veterans and were stationed in Italy when they met.