For this year’s International Missing Children’s Day, we, the
members of Unit 1012, will thank the Justice Department of Justice for
honoring those who support the observance.
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NATIONAL MISSING CHILDREN’S DAY
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Department of Justice
Office of
Public Affairs
FOR IMMEDIATE
RELEASE
Wednesday, May 20, 2020
Justice Department Observes National Missing Children’s Day
Department Honors Law Enforcement Officers and a School Bus Driver for Efforts to Rescue Missing and Exploited Children; Announces Poster Contest Winner
The Department of Justice today
announced awards to nine courageous individuals, which include law enforcement
officers from Wisconsin, Louisiana and Florida, as well as a school bus driver
from Florida, for their efforts in finding missing children and bringing child
sexual predators and child pornographers to justice.
“The Department of Justice is proud to
honor the law enforcement officers and private citizens who showed courage, presence
of mind, and an unwavering commitment to protecting children from dangerous
predators,” said Attorney General William P. Barr. “We thank these heroes,
whose actions made it possible to bring to justice those who attempted to
exploit our most innocent and vulnerable citizens.”
“The safety, indeed the very lives, of
our nation’s children depend on constant vigilance by skilled professionals and
citizens willing to keep a watchful eye on the young people in their charge,”
said Katharine T. Sullivan, Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General for the
Office of Justice Programs. “The honors we confer on these exceptional
individuals come with our highest respect and our deepest gratitude.”
President Ronald Reagan proclaimed May
25, 1983, the first National Missing Children’s Day in memory of 6-year-old
Etan Patz, who disappeared while walking to his bus stop in lower Manhattan on
May 25, 1979. National Missing Children’s Day honors his memory as well as
those children still missing. Etan’s killer was convicted in February 2017 for
the 1979 murder, but the case remains active with the National Center for
Missing & Exploited Children because his body was never found.
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Justice
Department Observes National #MissingChildrensDay
& announces awards to 9 courageous individuals for their efforts in find
missing children and bringing child sexual predators and child pornographers to
justice.
[PHOTO SOURCE: https://www.facebook.com/ |
Today’s announcement is part of the 37th
annual commemoration of National Missing Children’s Day. Due to restrictions
resulting from COVID-19, the in-person ceremony to honor the recipients has
been canceled. Instead, this website features
information about the awardees and statements from Office of Justice Programs
Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General Katharine T. Sullivan and Office of
Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP) Administrator Caren Harp.
“The vigilance of these law enforcement
officers demonstrates the crucial need for dedicated and timely investigative
work in stopping those who would hurt children,” said OJJDP Administrator Caren
Harp. “We applaud them for returning the missing children, holding sex
offenders accountable and stopping further child victimization.”
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Memorial to the children
of Lidice in the park in front of the museum.
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Attorney General’s Special Commendation: This commendation recognizes the extraordinary efforts and significant investigative or program contributions of an Internet Crimes Against Children task force or affiliate agency, or an individual assigned to either.
- Recipients: Criminal Investigation Director Matthew Joy, Commander of the Wisconsin Department of Justice’s Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force in Appleton, Wisconsin, and Special Agent in Charge Jesse Crowe, Supervisor of the Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force for the Western District of Wisconsin. Director Joy and SAC Crowe led an urgent search of a house and located a missing 14-year-old girl. She had been transported across state lines by a suspected child molester with whom she had been chatting online. The man received a sentence of 11 years and 3 months in federal prison.
- Recipient: Ms. JoAnn Donovan of Punta Gorda, Florida. When a 15-year-old girl with special needs did not board the school bus that picked her up at her foster home, she was reported missing. As part of their investigation, officers interviewed Ms. Donovan, the bus driver, who told police that the girl had recently been talking on her cell phone with her biological mother, from whose custody she had been removed. An alert yielded a photo of the girl and her mother passing through a tollbooth in another state. Police returned the girl to her foster family unharmed just one day after she went missing, and her mother will spend two years in jail.
- Recipient: Senior Inspector Gerald Dysart of the U.S. Marshals Service, New Orleans, Louisiana. Mr. Dysart provided the expertise and guidance for Operation Empty Nest in Atlanta, Georgia, which recovered 16 missing children over a span of two weeks. Among the recovered were children who were victims of sex trafficking, exploitation, and sexual and physical abuse.
- Recipients: Detectives Chastity Burke, Dennis Miller, Detectives Keith Earney, Jason Turner, Ruben Escobar and Eugene Mefford, all of the Child Exploitation Unit at the Volusia County Sheriff’s Office in Daytona Beach, Florida. The six detectives rescued two child victims within six hours of executing an emergency search warrant. The suspect was found with the preschool girls, with whom he had appeared in a disturbing video provided to the detectives. A forensic examination of the suspect’s phone showed hundreds of images and videos of child pornography. He was arrested for child molestation and possession of child pornography.
In 2019, the FBI’s National Crime Information Center included 421,394 entries for missing children. Additional information about National Missing Children’s Day is available online.
The year 2020 marks the 150th anniversary of the Department of Justice. Learn more about the history of our agency at www.Justice.gov/Celebrating150Years.
INTERNET SOURCE: https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-observes-national-missing-children-s-day-1
..... ….. https://www.facebook.com/VictimsFamiliesForTheDeathPenalty/posts/2808892619232686
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Anne Frank, the young Jewish girl whose diary chronicled the Holocaust,
and Emmett Till, whose brutal slaying in Mississippi galvanized the Civil
Rights Movement, meet for an imaginary conversation in "Anne &
Emmett," a play to be staged Monday in Topeka by the Brown Foundation of
Topeka. (FILE PHOTOGRAPHS/THE ASSOCIATED PRESS)
[PHOTO SOURCE: http://cjonline.com/life/2010-05-12/martyred_teens_remembered]
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