Tracking Wanderers Made Easier

Protecting the elderly and youth in Knox County is the focus of a non-profit organization that uses electronic technology to locate missing persons.

Founded in 2005 as Project Lifesaver, the program will relaunch Feb. 1 as Rapid Recovery of Knox County. In coordination with the Knox County Sheriff’s Department and the Galesburg Police Department, the organization provides electronic monitoring bracelets to anyone suffering from mental conditions where they may wander and become lost. “The programs helps children suffering from autism or Down syndrome or adults with dementia or Alzheimer’s disease,” explained Rapid Recovery board member Marianne Wiesen. “Anyone who is inclined to wander away would qualify.”

The group owns 14 electronic monitoring bracelets which may be rented for a monthly fee to qualifying families. The rental fee provides a new battery each month and monthly maintenance on the bracelet by a trained volunteer.

Read more at The (Galesburg, IL) Register-Mail.

43 Katrina Victims Still Unidentified

On the corner of Canal Street and City Park Avenue, six granite buildings hold the final mysteries of Hurricane Katrina.

Here, in these mausoleums, are 43 bodies of unidentified victims — people whose fingerprints, dental records and DNA were not enough to shed light on who they were. Three-and-a-half years after the torrential floods killed 1,500 people across the Gulf Coast and put 80% of New Orleans under water, workers in the city's forensic center are still trying to close the book on Katrina's final chapter.

Read the full story at USA Today.

Brea Landfill Searched for Missing 82 Year-Old Woman

Authorities on Thursday began searching a Brea landfill with earthmovers and a cadaver dog in an attempt to find an 82-year-old grandmother who vanished this week.

The son of Sara Mowry reported her missing from her Laguna Niguel assisted-living home Tuesday, said Orange County Sheriff's Department spokesman Jim Amormino.

About 20 investigators arrived at the landfill, in the 1900 block of Valencia Avenue, at midday, acting on an investigative lead, officials said. Amormino declined to elaborate.

The investigation has not been labeled a homicide; Mowry is considered a "critical" missing person who disappeared "under highly suspicious circumstances," Amormino said. No suspects have been named.

Read more at the Los Angeles Times.

National Center for Missing Adults Being Run by Volunteers After Budget Cuts

Last year, Kym Pasqualini's nonprofit agency ran out of money.

For 15 years, the National Center for Missing Adults helped track the thousands of adults who go missing in this country every year — and did its best to reconnect them with their families. The agency operated on roughly $1 million annually, thanks to a federal grant.

But in 2005, the bipartisan bill that initially funded the grant expired. With no explanation, Congress failed to reauthorize it.

For two years, Pasqualini and her employees stayed alive by trimming operations, cutting services, taking pay cuts — and waiting for Congress to get its act together. By the fall of 2007, they were completely out of money.nt and may require same day, out of County, or out of State service.

Read how volunteers are working tirelessly to keep the NCMA alive.

Should "Silver Alerts" Become as Prevalent as "Amber Alerts"?

The missing-person case of Robert Ouellette of Cotuit makes the case for a statewide "Silver Alert" system like the "Amber Alerts" issued for missing and kidnapped children.

Florida followed the lead of a dozen other states and created a Silver Alert program in October. It's been used at least 19 times, and all the subjects were found.

Cape police — led by Barnstable — have done a good job making the 80-year-old Ouellette a priority, and other agencies and individuals have spent time and searched back roads and parking lots, too. But a statewide alert system would carry the urgency over the bridge to millions of more eyes that could be looking for Ouellette's light blue 2000 Mercury Marquis, license plate 472 BXC.

Read more at the Cape Cod Times.

Google Street View Helps Find Missing Child

Using technology more commonly seen in television crime dramas, an Athol police officer and a deputy chief in the town's Fire Department were able to track a woman and her allegedly kidnapped 9-year-old granddaughter to a motel in south-central Virginia.

They notified Virginia State Police, who yesterday arrested Rose M. Maltais of 14 Grove St. without incident around 4:15 p.m.

Natalie Maltais will soon be back home with her legal guardians after Virginia State Police found her with her 52-year-old grandmother, Ms. Maltais, at the Budget Inn in Natural Bridge, Va.

Read the full story at the Telegram Gazette.