Amber Alert
What is the "AMBER Alert System"?
AMBER Alert System is a rapid response to child abduction. It's a rapid response recovery program that combines the resources of law enforcement, the media, and the public to recover a missing child. Now in its general terms, as each state has a different stipulation to exactly what age of a child is represented, but in its general terms it would be a child under eighteen years old that is kidnapped in front of witnesses whose life is believed to be endangered. The law enforcement can then share this information with the public so that the public can aid in recovery of that child.
Why was the AMBER Alert System created?
Well, the AMBER Alert System was created in response to the kidnap and murder of little Amber Hagerman in Arlington, Texas in 1996. Amber was kidnapped in front of a witness by somebody in a black pickup truck. But that information was never imparted to the public. Three days later they found Amber's broken body by a creek and information came out that she had been kidnapped by somebody in a black pickup. So the questions started to be asked in the Dallas/Fort Worth area if that information was known, why it wasn't shared to the public so that the public would be able to assist in the recovery. That was the genesis then of the AMBER Alert. Its a testament, a legacy to a little girl who was murdered named Amber; that's what it is.
Is the AMBER Alert System effective?
The AMBER Alert System is effective but it could be much more effective because the system that's been created, the so called national system that's been created has been created upon bureaucracy. What they've done is they've encompassed each alert within a state and created an AMBER alert coordinator that has to greenlight any kind of an AMBER alert, which I find odd, because it was conceived as local law enforcement, local media, and local public but now we have to go through various bureaucrats within a state in order to activate or authorize an AMBER alert. So if, in fact, a child is kidnapped in front of witnesses and one has trouble locating the AMBER alert coordinator, oftentimes many hours can go by before the information is imparted to the public. Since it's a state based system that operates under letters of authorization between various states, it's illegal to activate an AMBER alert in an adjoining state without going through that whole process with that state's AMBER alert coordinator. So what you've done is you've created an environment where children that live near borders are at a disadvantage to children that live within the interior of a state or that children on the East Coast, because it is so heavily congested and the states are so small and so close together, are at much greater disadvantage than children in western states.
How can the AMBER Alert System become more effective?
What you have to do in order to have a successful AMBER Alert, I believe, is you have to give local law enforcement the ability to authorize their own AMBER Alerts within their own communities, and give them a means of doing the kind of an information distribution that will be most effective. Children can be kidnapped at a mile a minute, and an AMBER Alert should be activated within the first couple of hours after the child has been kidnapped, or even sooner. You want to create a small radius and you want to make sure the information gets out over the radio so that people driving their cars can assist, so that all law enforcement agencies are aware of it, so that all media outlets are aware of it, and so that things like service stations, convenience stores, fast food outlets, and transportation depots are all aware that that child has been kidnapped. You also want that child's poster or that child's face to be somehow available at that location. You do that, and you're going to create an AMBER Alert system that's going to be much, much more successful than the one that currently exists. You want to create an AMBER Alert System that's based on intelligence as apart from one that's based on bureaucracy.
How can I help law enforcement with the AMBER Alert?
The AMBER alert is activated through a variety of means. The, the most useful is the radio because people driving in their cars are listening to the radio. It's also activated by television sets but I don't know what somebody sitting at home watching TV, how they're going to be able to effect a missing child case in most instances. It also goes out over highway signs, and we all see them now, the big signs that will tell you if a child's missing and that's less successful. In my community: Bay area, they refuse to activiate AMBER alerts on the highway signs during peak traffic hours because it'll slow the traffic down even more. The emergency alert system, which was originally created twentieth century, is a response to the nuclear threat, is also utilized for AMBER alerts. Then they have people like the TSA people at the airports who are informed of the AMBER alerts as well. And again, I don't understand that. I mean, I just don't get it. The most successful way to activate an AMBER alert is through the radio, though. Always has been and it always will be. Because that then turns everybody into a first responder.
Does every state have an AMBER Alert System?
There are something like 130 different AMBER Alert Systems. There's no real co-ordination between them. There are state, regional, and city wide AMBER Alert Systems. There are also a variety of Internet-based AMBER Alert systems as well. The one thing that they all have in common, though, is getting the word out about children that are abducted by predators as quickly as they possibly can.
