Grim Sleeper Probe Sees 4 New Missing Person Cases

Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck says detectives investigating the suspected "Grim Sleeper" serial killer have opened four new missing person cases.

Beck told KTLA-TV on Thursday that the cases were opened after investigators were flooded with information following the release of about 180 photos that were found in the home of Lonnie Franklin Jr., who was arrested in July and has pleaded not guilty to the murders of 10 women.

Beck says investigators have so far been able to identify more than 50 of the women.

He says it was a tough decision to release the photos, many of which include women in sexual acts, but he was confident additional victims would be discovered.

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Detectives Suspect Foul Play in Missing Persons Case

Indianapolis —Investigators fear the worst for an Indianapolis man who has been missing for several months. Michael Summers, 44, was last seen on August 20th at Bryant's Friendly Inn Tavern on South East Street.

Since he disappeared, metro police say there has been no activity on his bank account or cell phone. He has also not been in contact with any family member, which is strange because his family doesn't believe he would voluntarily stay away from them during the holidays.

Before he went missing, Summers was in the process of trying to save his father's home from repossession. Detectives suspect foul play in his disappearance.

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Utah Girl Turns Up In Sacramento After Missing Person's Alert; Man Arrested

SACRAMENTO —A 13-year-old Utah girl will be reunited with her family later this week after being discovered in Sacramento with a 30-year-old man.

According to KSL-TV, 13-year-old Astrid Valdivia of Clearfield, Utah left her family a note saying she was running away from home last September. Based on information passed on from Valdivia's family to police, a missing person's alert known as the Endangered Persons Advisory was issued for Valdivia Tuesday afternoon.

By Tuesday evening, police had been tipped off that Valdivia was staying with 30-year-old Sacramento resident Anthony Martinez. Local authorities investigated the tip, located the pair and arrested Martinez on suspicion of child endangerment and resisting arrest.

Martinez is expected to be charged by authorities in Utah with kidnapping.

Police say Valdivia will be reunited with her family soon.

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Vader Now a Suspect in McCann Missing Persons Case

Travis Edward Vader is now considered a suspect in the case of a missing Alberta elderly couple.

Previously, RCMP would only refer to Vader has a person of interest, but they now say foul play is suspected.

Lyle and Marie McCann went missing July 3rd. Two days later their burned motorhome was found near Edson and days after that, their abandoned S-U-V was discovered.

The couple had been on their way to B.C to visit their family.

Vader was named a person of interest 13 days after the couple went missing.

RCMP won't disclose what information gathered lead them to name him as a suspect. Vader remains in custody on unrelated charges.

The McCann children are offering up thousands of dollars in reward money for information that leads investigators to the couple and results in the arrest and conviction of those responsible.

Read more here!

Search Ends For Lake Michigan Crash Survivors

Authorities today called off search for finding four people missing since a small plane plunged into Lake Michigan Friday morning. The plane crashed while flying a cancer patient to the Mayo Clinic. Jerry Freed, the 66-year-old pilot of the plane, was rescued following the crash several miles off the west Michigan coast. The rescuers searched for the missing persons for 27 hours but in vain. “Rescuers concluded there was little chance anyone else had survived,”said Petty Officer Brandon Blackwell of the U.S. Coast Guard's district headquarters in Cleveland.
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"We can resume a search if credible information is received that persons missing may be alive. At this point, we saturated an area that's approximately 1,000 square miles . . . and we've turned up nothing," Petty Officer Blackwell told the Associated Press.

The missing persons are co-pilot Earl Davidson; Alma schools Superintendent Don Pavlik; his wife, Irene; and Dr. James Hall. All were residents of Alma, a central Michigan town 150 miles northwest of Detroit. Pavlik was diagnosed with cancer of the esophagus earlier this week and Freed and Davidson had offered to fly him to the medical center in Rochester, Minn., for treatment. Dr. Hall joined them, said Costanzo.


Talking to Mount Pleasant Morning Sun Dr. Hall's wife, Ann, said that the doctor's medical bag had been recovered. "We are praying to God that all (will) be taken care of. We love you. Jim," wrote James Hall. Freed was released from the hospital yesterday, confirmed hospital spokesman Bill Kerans. He added that Freed was unwilling to give an interview.

"We can resume a search if credible information is received that persons missing may be alive. At this point, we saturated an area that's approximately 1,000 square miles . . . and we've turned up nothing," Petty Officer Blackwell told the Associated Press.

The missing persons are co-pilot Earl Davidson; Alma schools Superintendent Don Pavlik; his wife, Irene; and Dr. James Hall. All were residents of Alma, a central Michigan town 150 miles northwest of Detroit. Pavlik was diagnosed with cancer of the esophagus earlier this week and Freed and Davidson had offered to fly him to the medical center in Rochester, Minn., for treatment. Dr. Hall joined them, said Costanzo.


Talking to Mount Pleasant Morning Sun Dr. Hall's wife, Ann, said that the doctor's medical bag had been recovered. "We are praying to God that all (will) be taken care of. We love you. Jim," wrote James Hall. Freed was released from the hospital yesterday, confirmed hospital spokesman Bill Kerans. He added that Freed was unwilling to give an interview.

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Will Joran van der Sloot Give Up Location of Natalee Holloway’s Body?

ORANJESTAD, Aruba (CBS/AP) Prosecutors in Aruba said they want to take Joran van der Sloot up on his offer to discuss the unsolved disappearance of American teenager Natalee Holloway.

Van der Sloot told his jailers he is ready to talk, but there's a catch.

The Dutch national, who is the only suspect in Holloway's 2005 disappearance, will only talk to Aruba authorities in Aruba.

Van der Sloot has said he fears for his life in the Peruvian prison, where he is awaiting trial in the slaying of 21-year-old Stephany Flores in his Lima hotel room.

Judicial authorities in Peru said they are willing to arrange a conversation between island police and Van der Sloot, but it's unlikely he would be brought to the Caribbean island before completing any sentence if convicted in the South American country, said Peter Blanken, the island's chief prosecutor.

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Prison Playing Cards Feature Missing Teen Brittanee Drexel

Authorities believe a new deck of cards featuring missing persons could help locate missing New York teen Brittanee Drexel.

Monica Caison with the CUE center for missing persons said the cards will be distributed throughout state prisons in hopes that clues will surface in the missing persons’ cases.

Drexel is featured on the two of diamonds.

According to helpfindbrittaneedrexel.com, “Effective Playing Cards” are released to every inmate in the Florida State Prison System.

The decks are also released in other participating states, including South Carolina.

“In the prison system guys talk, and Florida had a case solved because one inmate heard a guy bragging about it,“ said Thomas Lucas, President of Spartanburg Crime Stoppers, the group that brought the cards to South Carolina. “These cards came out and [the inmate] said, ‘I know who did this’.“

The Drexel family is on the Grand Strand for a series of events this weekend that mark the one year anniversary of the disappearance of Brittanee.

They attended the unveiling of the deck of cards Friday.

Saturday, a march down Ocean Boulevard will start at 5:30 at the Bar Harbor Motel and will end at the Blue Water Resort, the hotel where Brittanee was last seen.

At 7:30 there will be a candle light vigil to raise awareness and mark the anniversary of Brittanee’s disappearance.

Caison said there are still constant searches going on for Brittanee, and believes the new playing cards could aid in those search efforts.

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NamUs Missing Person Database Goes Unused by 93 Percent of Law Enforcement

Since 2009, families and medical examiners have had access to a free online database that's designed to assist in the identification of more than 40,000 sets of unidentified remains across the country. Dubbed "NamUs," short for the National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, the program allows both parties to enter identifying characteristics of a missing person or unidentified body in the hopes that this information exchange will help match a face to a fate.

It's a grim consolation for those whose friends or families have been affected by violence or accidents. Nevertheless, the Associated Press reports that the free service has helped solved 16 cases since the cross-matching feature went live in July of last year. The numbers don't end there: the service is home to around 6,200 unidentified sets of remains, 2,800 missing people, and--according to The Crime Report--has been accessed (on the missing persons front) by more than 185,000 people as of January 2009.

What's the problem? According to the AP, only 1,100 of the nation's 17,000 law enforcement agencies, or 6.5 percent, are registered with the service. That's partly a publicity issue, as numerous law enforcement agencies simply don't know the service exists. Others are more leery about using limited resources to participate in the service.

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Minnesota Bill Could Speed Up Tracking Missing People

ST. PAUL -- The assistant St. Paul police chief says authorities may have found an 18-year-old Eveleth man's body quicker last year if they had tracked his mobile telephone.

A bill making its way through the Minnesota Legislature was written to make the job easier by requiring mobile telephone companies to tell law enforcement officers the whereabouts of missing people's mobile phones.

Last April 5, Dan Zamlen went missing in St. Paul. More than 1,000 fellow Iron Rangers searched for him along the Mississippi River, but his body was not found until nearly a month later. His death was ruled an accidental drowning.

"Perhaps with this bill ... we could have gotten on this even quicker," Assistant Chief Nancy DiPerna said Thursday, just before a Senate committee unanimously approved the bill.

A House committee takes up the measure this morning.

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Former Growing Pains actor Andrew Koenig missing in Vancouver

Family and friends are anxious about the safety of actor Andrew Koenig -- who played Boner in the '80s TV show Growing Pains -- after he disappeared in Vancouver last week.

Koenig, son of actor Walter Koenig, who played Pavel Chekov on the original Star Trek TV series, is believed to have sent his family a letter post-marked Feb. 15 from Vancouver before his disappearance. Koenig, 41, is said to have been suffering from depression.

He arrived in Vancouver on Feb. 10 and was due to fly out of Vancouver on Feb. 16 but never boarded the flight.

Read more here.

Mother Takes Fight For Missing Persons To Capitol Hill

All eyes were on Sen.-elect Scott Brown this week.

Made sense. The former Cosmo centerfold (bleh) who turned the political landscape upside down with his Republican win in Massachusetts (ouch) made his Washington debut Thursday with rock star fanfare.

But as hot as Brown was, my attention that day was on an admittedly less star-studded U.S. House of Representative Judiciary Committee hearing.

I know, Dullsville.

And yet I found myself riveted to a live feed as a mother described her nearly five-year search for her son in hopes of reforming the way missing-persons cases are handled.

In heartbreaking detail, Janice Smolinski testified before a congressional subcommittee in favor of Billy's Law — named after her 31-year-old son, Billy Smolinski Jr., who went missing in Waterbury on Aug. 24, 2004.

Smolinski told judiciary members about her son's disappearance and the additional frustrations heaped on families already dealing with the agonizing loss of a loved one.

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Chicago police to tune missing person's policy

Chicago Police Superintendent Jody Weis says he is taking a closer look at the department's new policy of issuing more alerts on missing teenagers.

Chicago Police alerts about missing young people suddenly increased a couple of weeks ago after the department felt criticism for a lack of response to the disappearance of Jahmeshia Conner. She is the 12-year-old whose body turned up two weeks after she disappeared.

Some advocates for teenagers at risk say they're concerned the public might become de-sensitized with so many alerts, that the department may be crying wolf, putting missing teenagers on a par with likely runaways.

Police Superintendent Weis tells Newsradio 780 he is taking another look at the new policy.

"We are forming a panel to look at this, to make sure we have the best protocols in place. But I would much rather err on the side of caution than to ever have a situation where someone could criticize us for not putting something out."

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Missing Persons - Is the curtain closing on your case?

The Missing Person Center opened online today and is ready to shed new light on current and cold missing person cases.

Over 2000 people go missing every day and most are not found. It’s not because they can’t be found, it’s simply because there are not enough people searching for them. Most missing person cases go completely unnoticed and others are not even reported to law enforcement. Not every case gets media attention and it’s hard to say why some cases get more attention than others. There are many reasons I have heard from people on this subject and many people think race is the determining factor in exposure when someone goes missing. However, the truth of the matter is timing and how much effort the family of the missing person puts into pressuring law enforcement and the media to take action.

If you have a missing loved one it will be up to you to have your story told, to get the word out and to get searches done and keep your loved one in the media’s eye. If you don’t stay proactive, time will slowly close the curtain on your case and eventually, no one will be looking. Don’t fall victim to the numbers of missing person cases you have to compete with.

The Missing Person Center was created by Los Angeles based licensed private investigator, Lawrence Olmstead of Hollywood P.I.. The Missing Person Center was an idea he had for a long time and finally felt something had to be done. “I don’t know if it’s the economy, technology or drugs, but I have seen a dramatic increase of missing people over the last ten years than years past”, said Olmstead. Lawrence Olmstead has been an investigator for 25 years and is a Court Qualified Missing Persons Expert in homicide cases where a body has not been found. “The Missing Person Center” is the place where families will find the resources they need and the information to keep their loved one’s story available and pushed into the hands of the media on a regular basis”, expressed the investigator.

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A Missing Child, a Leadership Journey

ao Tzu said, "To lead people, walk beside them." I have tried to live up to this standard through my unexpected leadership journey as president and CEO of the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC).
Twenty-five years ago, I was in public life in my native Louisville, Kentucky. It was not my aspiration to lead a national organization or even to leave Louisville. Yet following the tragic abductions of Etan Patz in New York, Adam Walsh in Florida, and twenty-nine children in Atlanta, I felt I had to do something.
At that time, police could enter information into the FBI's national crime computer about stolen cars, stolen guns, even stolen horses - but not stolen children. They had mandatory waiting periods before they would even take a report of a missing child. I felt our national laws and systems were inadequate and that children were suffering. I wanted to bring attention to these issues so policy makers would respond.

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So why did Madeleine McCann detectives ask so few questions after major breakthrough?

Private detectives leading the hunt for Madeleine McCann faced questions last night after a Mail on Sunday investigation revealed apparent shortcomings in chasing a ‘strong lead’.

The detectives failed to make even rudimentary inquiries before announcing a ‘significant’ development in the worldwide search for the six-year-old.

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Connecticut Rep. Proposses Legilation on Missing Adults

The unsolved case of a man who disappeared five years ago has prompted a Connecticut congressman to propose federal legislation aimed at improving efforts to find missing adults nationwide.

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New Tracking System Unveiled to Track Elderly Missing Persons

DARLINGTON COUNTY, SC (WMBF) - A new tracking system to locate persons suffering from Alzheimers and other illnesses is making its debut in Darlington County.

Deputies with the Darlington County Sheriff's Office are training Tuesday and Wednesday to use the Project Lifesaver program that helps track down people with "at risk" wandering traits.

Sheriff Wayne Byrd says the program will be online at darcosc.com for the public to access information on those missing in the area. Transmitters will be provided to at-risk people that will be worn as a wristband or an anklet. If the person goes missing, family members can call police to track their loved one down.

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Many Missing Aussies are Elderly

About 35,000 people are reported missing to police annually, many of them older Australians suffering dementia or memory loss.

This year's campaign focuses on that group, which Governor-General Quentin Bryce said would comprise almost 500,000 Australians by 2030.

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Social Security Administration Helps Find Missing People On Occassion

If you are trying to find someone concerning a matter of great importance, such as a death or serious illness in the missing person's immediate family, or a sizeable amount of money due the missing person, Social Security can attempt to forward a letter to the missing person. This must concern a matter about which the missing person is unaware and would undoubtedly want to be informed.

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Being "Maliciously Missing" Not Illegal

How many times have you heard about a missing person case? To be sure there are hundreds of thousands of Americans reported missing every year. Some come right back home. But too often families of the missing either get the horrible news that their loved one's body has been found or they continue to suffer with the quiet torment of no news at all.

Then there is the group of missing people who aren't really missing at all. They are hiding. They're called the "maliciously missing" by a woman who knows the subject all too well.

Read more here.