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Saturday Morning News

St. Louis Police Implement Child-Abduction Alert System

Aired January 13, 2001 - 9:16 a.m. ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN ANCHOR: Now to some news that will interest parents out there, a child abduction alert system. It was developed to alert TV and radio stations within minutes of a child's abduction. Police in the St. Louis area launched the alert system this week and joining us to talk about it is the St. John Police Chief Terry Mylam (ph). He started the program in the St. Louis area.

Good morning to you, Chief.

TERRY MYLAM, ST. JOHN POLICE CHIEF: Good morning.

O'BRIEN: Thanks for being with us. Tell us how you got the idea for this and just layout how it works briefly.

MYLAM: I attended a seminar and heard a presentation from some officers from North Little Rock, Arkansas, and they had a similar program called the Morgan Nick Program (ph) which was designed to assist in the return of children. Unfortunately after Morgan Nick disappeared it was never found and it was also based upon a program from the Fort Worth area called the Amber Plan (ph) and also named after a little girl who had been abducted and subsequently murdered. We brought the program here to the St. Louis area and called it the SARAH Plan (ph), and it's not named after any individual little girl but it does connotate (ph) the girl's name and it stands for the St. Louis Area Regional Abduction Alert.

O'BRIEN: All right, and, Chief, could you just tell us briefly how it works?

MYLAM: The officers who arrive on a call of a - of an abduction or a kidnapping will take the necessary information. If they verify that it has been a kidnapping or abduction they will then notify a local TV or radio station who will use the Emergency Broadcasting tone alert to notify the other stations and then they put this alert out over the radio and the television. They interrupt regular broadcasting so that the eyes and ears of the community can assist us in hopefully finding the perpetrator and the return of the child.

O'BRIEN: And why is it - why this particular crime? Is this something that is needed or essential? There are many other crimes in which it would be nice to have the community looking for the perpetrators. Why this one crime? Why would this be the one you'd use that particular Emergency Broadcast System? MYLAM: Number one, it's a very emotional issue with children being involved and number two, statistics tell law enforcement that nothing really good ever comes out of an abduction. The end result is hardly ever in the favor of the child.

O'BRIEN: I suppose the concern might be that if there are a series of these alerts eventually the public might begin to tune them out. How do you address that concern?

MYLAM: We limit it to only a few alerts that meet criteria. Number one, the child must be under the age of 16, law enforcement must verify that it is an abduction alert also with a description of the perpetrator and hopefully a vehicle and we do not do anything with parental kidnapping or abductions.

O'BRIEN: And you mentioned that last point. In closing, just to give people a sense of how serious a problem this is, I think there is a general sense that most of the abductions, as it were, are related to family disputes. Is - what are the numbers right now? Is this a trend which persists?

MYLAM: It is a trend but with the parental kidnapping and abductions the harm very seldom occurs with the child and we're worried about the people who are abducting these children for other reasons.

O'BRIEN: All right, Chief Terry Mylam who is with the St. John Police Department in the St. Louis area starting an interesting effort and we will be checking in with you later to see how it goes. Please keep us posted.

MYLAM: Thank you.

O'BRIEN: All right, thanks for being with us on "CNN Saturday Morning."

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