This brief discusses the significant contribution of police search and rescue to the successful location and resolution of missing persons cases. Across seven chapters, this volume offers a detailed examination of the routine practices of police search and rescue personnel. To do so, it draws from a collection of data, including in-depth interviews with police and thousands of different types of missing persons records. Laced with the stories of missing persons, it presents a detailed overview of what these teams do, the processes and procedures employed, and the tools and technologies in police search and rescue. It explores some of the challenges impacting police search and rescue response, emphasizing how to leverage this work in the field. This book also identifies future trends to address the “What may be next” question in the police search and rescue response to missing persons. As the first analysis of the role of police in search and rescue missions, this brief is of interest to law enforcement professionals and researchers of policing, policymakers, and professionals in psychology, criminology, sociology, and beyond

This Bulletin provides information on the numbers and characteristics of two groups of children not frequently recognized in the literature on missing children: those involuntarily missing because they were lost, injured, or stranded and those missing for benign reasons. The estimates reported in this Bulletin are derived from two components of the Second National Incidence Studies of Missing, Abducted, Runaway, and Thrownaway Children (NISMART-2): the National Household Survey of Adult Caretakers and the National Household Survey of Youth. These surveys were conducted during 1999 and reflect the experiences of children in the United States over a 12-month period. Because the vast majority of cases were concentrated in 1999, the annual period the Bulletin refers to is 1999.

The result of the second part of the project is a comprehensive Directory of civil society organisations working in the field of missing and sexually exploited children. The directory contains information on the mission, role, structure, practices and contact details of over 250 of such organisations in the 15 EU Member States and 4 Candidate States, including national approaches on their cooperation with the competent authorities. It is the first practical Europe-wide directory for supporting day-to-day national and international cooperation between and with civil society organisations working in the field of missing and sexually exploited children. Child Focus and IRCP hope the directory proves to be a valuable tool in helping and assisting child victims, parents and practitioners throughout Europe. Alongside with this printed version, the project team has also released the information contained in the directory in an even more user-friendly, interactive format, producing a searchable database on CD-rom and creating the current Childoscope website, which offers on-line access to the updated and extendable database information.

While most people have heard about high-profile abductions such as the Elizabeth Smart case, such abductions are not isolated cases. The abduction of children occurs much more often in our country than most people would suspect, but because of a fault in our country's national crime reporting procedures, no one knows the true number. This book details the scope of the child abduction problem in the United States, and its very real danger. It covers the different types of abductions and discusses the psychological changes that can occur in long-term abducted children that will often stop them from attempting to escape, or even to seek help, though good opportunities may present themselves. Snow also discusses the danger to secondary victims of child abduction. He devotes several chapters to what both parents and the government can do to stop many of the child abductions that now occur, and, for those not stopped, steps parents can take that will greatly assist the authorities in quickly locating and safely rescuing an abducted child. He concludes with a chapter on the psychological and emotional concerns of recovered abducted children, and how families can help them re-integrate themselves into a normal life. Real life examples are provided in every chapter. It is every parent's worst nightmare. Someone has abducted their child, and no one, including the police, has a clue where the child is. But worse, while parents feel certain their child is terrified and crying desperately for them, they don't know if their child is being physically mistreated, sexually molested, or worse. The uncertainty and powerlessness can drive parents of abducted children to the edge of insanity. But there are measures parents and children can take to avoid being the victim of abduction. There are things families can do, too, to apprehend offenders and bring children home even after an abduction occurs. Here, a retired police captain offers expert advice designed to help keep children safe and to help families deal with an abduction once it has occurred. Practical advice is offered throughout to families and professionals that will help all involved handle this tense and terrifying experience. Featuring such prominent cases as the abductions of the Groene children in Idaho in 2005, Christopher Michael Barrios in Georgia in 2007, Zina Linnick in Washington in 2007, Mychael Darthard-Dawodu in Texas in 2007, Crystal Chavez in Texas in 2002, Elizabeth Smart in Utah in 2002, the Montano children in Florida in 2003, the Walker children in Indiana in 2007, the Nunez children in California in 2002, Emily Johnson in Indiana in 2007, Ludwig Koons in New York in 1993, the Beveridge children to the United States from Australia in 2000, Erica Pratt in Pennsylvania in 2002, Clay Moore in Florida in 2007, the Hari children in Illinois in 2005, Samantha Runnion in California in 2002, Ben Ownby in Missouri in 2007, Shawn Hornbeck in Missouri in 2002, Steven Stayner in California in 1972, Natascha Kampusch in Austria in 1998, Jessica Lunsford in Florida in 2005, Carlie Brucia in Florida in 2004, Amber Hagerman in Texas in 1996, the Nguyen children in Canada in 2006, and Cecilie Finkelstein from Sweden to the United States in 1975.

Ericson and Haggerty contend that the police have become information brokers to institutions such as insurance companies and health and welfare organizations that operate based on a knowledge of risk.

Policing Child Sexual Abuse provides a historical overview of the evolution of policing child sexual abuse in Queensland, tracing a legacy of failure (even corruption) in the decades leading up to the foundation of Task Force Argos, a branch of the Queensland Police Service created in part as a response to criticisms of police shortcomings in this area. The book uses archival material as a foundation to trace the shifting approach to policing child sexual abuse (CSA) from the 1960s, when juvenile justice first became a central focus of policing in Queensland, to the 2010s, at which point Task Force Argos made international headlines for its primary role in bringing major international CSA offenders like Shannon McCoole, Benjamin "Warhead" Faulkner and Richard Huckle to justice. Examining archival material to pinpoint the reasons that CSA was not dealt with effectively in the past, the book shows that often these reasons were political, unrelated to the policing of CSA at all. Policing Child Sexual Abuse stands as a testament to the victims of CSA who have been failed by the system in the past. In addition, the book acts as a case study of how a police force with such a negative track record in policing this area was able to correct its path and reform its practices, to the point that it could emerge as a world leader in policing CSA. Though nominally focused on policing in one Australian state, the implications are global, with Task Force Argos’s work naturally impacting on the CSA investigations of all of its partner agencies, both in Australia and internationally. Demonstrating how, even in contexts where police responses to CSA have been met with significant criticism, an opportunity still exists to reject historical failures in favour of a renewed commitment to proactive policing, this book will be of great interest to scholars of policing, historical criminology, and child sexual abuse.