© Credit National Center for Missing and Exploited Children Missing from Georgia: KATELIN MARIE COOK
Lisa Irwin from Missouri is still missing, and she is one of thousands of people who disappear each year across the country. Of the 80 children missing in Georgia, three are from our area.
The mysterious disappearing case of baby Lisa Irwin is sparking national conversation about missing children everywhere, as law enforcement in Missouri frantically search for the child.
According to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, roughly 800,000 children (those younger than 18) are reported missing each year. That's an average of 2,000 children per day. More than 80 are missing from Georgia, as listed on the Center's website. Three of those kids are, sadly, from Norcross.
Twenty-five percent of these children, or 200,000, are abducted by family members, according to the Center. Some 58,000 were abducted by non-family members, and 115 children are taking in "stereotypical" kidnapping cases. Those are the cases where children are likely to be kept overnight by strangers,held for ransom, transported more than 50 miles away, killed or permanently kept.
Tips from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children:
How to prepare if your child goes missing:
- Keep a complete description of your child on hand.
- Take color photographs of your child every six months.
- Have your dentist prepare and maintain dental charts for your child, and be sure they are updated each time an examination or dental work is performed.
- Know where your child's medical records are located.
- Arrange with your local law-enforcement agency to have your child fingerprinted and keep the fingerprints in a safe and easily accessible place.
- Keep a DNA sample from your child, like an old toothbrush in a brown envelope licked closed by your child, at room temperature in a dry, easily accessible place that is far away from heat.
- REYNA GABRIELLA ALVARADO-CARRERA, missing since May 2005 from Norcross, Ga. She would be 19 now.
- KATELIN MARIE COOK, missing since April 2011 form Norcross, Ga. She would be 16 now.
- MARISA VELASCO, missing since December 2005 from Norcross, Ga. She would be 7 now.
- RHEA IMMACULATE ARUL, missing since July 2010 from Smyrna, Ga. She would be 4 now.
- ANTONIO JAMES CAMPBELL, missing since December 2007 from Gainesville, Ga. He would be 6 now.
- ALEXIS MARIE DUKES-JONES, missing since May 2010 from Lithonia, Ga.. She would be 16 now.
- JUSTIN GLEN GAINES, missing since November 2007 from Duluth, Ga. He would be 22 now.
- DURESHIA PETERS, missing since July 2011 from Decatur, Ga. She would be 16 now.
- MARIO ENRIQUE VARGAS, missing since June 2008 from Marietta, Ga. He would be 7 now.
- TAMIKA SHEA WHITSON, missing since November 2010 from Lithonia, Ga. She would be 17 now.
is 1/5th of 1% of population of a populations totaling 350 million (It is recognized that recent census figures are lower that the actual population, given the reticence of some to participate.). To the point: this number implies that 1 kid out of every 500 U.S. citizens (child or adult) is reported missing each year. Is this true? If this is true, then it is likely that not one small community in the United States hasn't experienced (Granted the majority of non-family related abduction are probably much more likely to occur in larger than 500-people communities.). I had no idea of the magnitude.