National Missing Children's Day, 2012

Statement

In 1983, when President Reagan declared the first National Missing Children's Day, he chose May 25th to commemorate the day that Etan Patz disappeared. Etan was not the first child to go missing, but his disappearance marked a turning point in the way we search for children in America. In a poignant twist, this year's National Missing Children's Day was accompanied by a break in Etan's case - almost 33 years to the day after he disappeared, a confession was finally obtained. I hope for the Patz family that this might offer some measure of closure and that knowing law enforcement never gave up pursuing his abductor would bring some measure of peace. And I hope it is some small comfort that because of their work, and the changes his case inspired, more missing children return home safely than ever before, both in America and across the world.

When six-year-old Etan disappeared in 1979, there was virtually no national procedure for finding missing children. Police departments did not share information; there were often mandatory waiting periods before a search could begin; and information about missing children could not be entered in to the FBI's national database - though it could be used for stolen cars, guns, even horses.

The tireless work by the Patzes - and the Walshes, whose son, Adam, was kidnapped and murdered in another devastating case two years later - brought national attention to the plight of missing children, and resulted in Congress passing the Missing Children Act in 1982. Among other things, it provided for information on missing children to be entered into the FBI's national database. In 1984, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children was created to help establish a national network and coordinated approach to finding children, especially in the early hours after the child is missed. Since its inception, the NCMEC has been instrumental in taking the recovery rate for missing children from 62 percent to 96 percent.

It was another tragic case that showed there was still more that could be done. In 1996, nine-year-old Amber Hagerman was kidnapped while riding her bicycle in Arlington, Texas. She was found four days later, murdered and abused; her killer was never found. The community was distraught. A Fort Worth mother, Diana Simone, suggested using the Emergency Alert System to notify the public when a child was abducted, and AMBER Alerts were born. It was clear that what began as a local effort in Texas needed to become a national system to stop child abduction across state lines. In 2002, I introduced S. 2896, the National AMBER Alert Network Act, which was signed into law in 2003. The program has been hugely successful. From its inception in 1996, the AMBER Alert system has safely returned more than 570 children home in America, and has served as a model for countries the world over in their own efforts to combat child abduction.

Another case had a successful conclusion because of the improvements in our system. The family of Elizabeth Smart, abducted from her bedroom in Salt Lake City, Utah when she was 14, never gave up the search. The Walsh family and NCMEC helped the Smart family keep the missing Elizabeth in the minds of law enforcement officials and the public. Nine months later, alert policemen spotted Elizabeth with her abductor and rescued her. The abductor has been sent to prison for life and Elizabeth, the poised and mature victim, is now an advocate for others who face the horrendous crime that she survived.

In 33 years, the Patzes never moved and never changed their phone number, just in case Etan found his way home. While the break in their case may finally offer answers, it is a tragic end to the story. In the time since Etan disappeared, America has made tremendous progress in preventing abductions and finding children who are taken. I thank the Patz family, the Walsh family, the Hagerman family, the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, the Smart family and all those who have worked unyieldingly over the years for children's protection; they have suffered unspeakable tragedy, but through their determination that no one else should suffer the same, they have made the world a safer place.

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