Slack founder’s child missing in notorious Tenderloin neighbourhood

Mint Butterfield is the child of billionaire tech entrepreneur Stewart Butterfield

The 16-year-old child of a co-founder of the messaging service Slack has gone missing in a notorious neighbourhood of San Francisco.

Mint Butterfield, whose dad is billionaire Stewart Butterfield, is thought to be in the Californian city’s Tenderloin area.

They were last seen late on Sunday night in Bolinas, a community on the other side of the Golden Gate Bridge from the city, and were reported missing the following morning by their mother.

It is thought they may have travelled to the Tenderloin, where they frequently spent time before running away from home.

The local sheriff’s office is ‘working with SFPD detectives to try and locate’ the teenager, Sergeant Adam Shermerhorn told the San Francisco Chronicle.

Located downtown, the Tenderloin neighbourhood has gained a reputation for crime and it has one of the largest homeless populations in the city.

It has also recently gained notoriety as a centre for California’s fentanyl crisis, part of the wider opioid crisis across the United States.

A New York Times report in 2018 described Tenderloin streets littered with heroin needles and piles of human excrement.

A police appeal for Mint Butterfield, who was last seen on Sunday night

Mint is thought to have been carrying a grey suitcase when last seen.

Their father Stewart named and co-founded communication platform Slack in 2012, ahead of its release to the public in August 2013.

It has since become an invaluable tool in offices around the world, with more than 10 million daily active users.

The company was sold to Salesforce for around $27.7 billion in December 2020.