Too many children are going missing in Virginia, as they are all over the country, and to try to contain this situation, the state's attorney general, Jason Miyares, last week gave a new impetus to the national campaign of giving away identification cards to minors.
On Thursday the 25th, when the nation was celebrating National Missing Children's Day, and together with the chief of the Manassas City Police Department, Douglas Keen, prosecutor Miyares announced at Grace E. Metz High School, a new delivery of such cards at all Virginia high schools. The children, for their part, will receive instructions to take the envelopes with the kits home to deliver to their parents.
“This is like fire insurance. You will only give this to the authorities if the unthinkable happens," Miyares emphasized, noting that the program, called "National Child ID Kits," was created in 1997 by American football coaches, after the kidnapping and death of child Amber Hagerman, which gave its name to the renowned Amber Alert (Amber Alert).
Since then, more than 75 million child identification kits have been distributed nationwide, through public and private partnerships.
The kits are specifically designed to help the Police during the first 24 hours, which are the most crucial in the case of a missing minor investigation.
In a televised presentation the same day, Lieutenant AmĂlcar Barahona -of the Manassas Police Community Planning and Services Division- recommended that after filling out the form that goes in the envelope, parents place a photo of their son , a copy of your fingerprint and DNA, like a bit of hair. Then they must save it, in case the unimaginable happens, such as a disappearance. In this hypothetical case, they must have the identification material ready from the beginning of the Police investigation, "which will give more opportunities and will gain time to locate the missing minor."
Likewise, Barahona assured the community that the information is confidential and will not be transmitted to any other system or national base.
Statistics indicate that every day more than 2,300 minors disappear in the country, many of them in their teenage years.
In Virginia, 2,500 children have been reported missing and 400 are actively missing, authorities reported.
During a conference at the same Metz school, former Washington Commanders defenseman Charles Mann, former Dallas Cowboys Hall of Famer Randy White, along with Manassas Police Chief Douglas Keen praised this program. .
Also supporting the initiative were Manassas Mayor Michelle Davis Younger, Prince William County Sheriff Glenn Hill and Prince William County Police Chief Peter Newsham.
