The case of 17 year old Chelsea King has been making headlines all over the news. A few days ago, Chelsea King, an honors student at a local San Diego high school was reported missing after not returning home from a jog. Her father found her BMW and other belongings at a trail overlooking a lake. Sadly, today they reportedly found her body in a shallow grave. She was sexually assaulted and then murdered. They currently have a registered sex offender named John Gardner in custody for the rape and murder of this teenage girl.
In this article: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,587622,00.html, they go in to great detail about the massive search conducted to find Chelsea.
"The San Diego County Sheriff's Department, along with the FBI and law enforcement from Riverside, San Bernardino and Orange counties, launched on all-out search for Chelsea using helicopters, infrared devices and search dogs to scour the park's rugged terain."
I personally have never seen this kind of response for missing person's who are of lower SES status and/minorities. A few months back I read an article in my hometown's newspaper about a 16 year old high school student who went missing in El Paso, Texas. The young lady had texted her mom to pick her up at school but when she got there, her daughter was nowhere to be found. The woman later received a message from her daughter saying that she was in Juarez and needed to be picked up there. Sadly, the young woman has not been seen or heard of since October. There were no massive searches by anybody, no helicopters, no info-red camera's, nothing. These poor parents have been all over Juarez, recently named the most dangerous city in the world, looking in hospitals and shelters in the hopes of finding their daughter.
Why is it that the cases of these rich, white, upper middle class victims make the headlines all over the national news while others do not?
I don't know who to answer this question can it be based on ethnicity and social economic standing due to more availability of funds that others. If we take both factors out of it in both cases it come down to the a child getting abducted by a predator that prays on children. Any person(s) who has been convicted of a sexual offenses against a child has to register as a sex offender has three levels.
the levels that i have found on
http://www.ci.kirkland.wa.us/depart/PD/Sex_Offenders_FAQ_s.htm
* Level I: Information about Level 1 offenders shall be shared with other law enforcement agencies and, upon request, the Department may disclose relevant, necessary, and accurate information to any victim or witness to the offense and to any individual community member who lives near the residence where the offender resides, expects to reside, or is regularly found. Level I offenders MAY NOT be the subject of general public notification. "LOW RISK."
* Level II: Relevant, necessary, and accurate information concerning Level II offenders may be disclosed to the public and private schools, child daycare centers, family daycare providers, businesses and organizations that serve primarily children, women or vulnerable adults, and neighbors and community groups near the residence where the offender resides, expects to reside, or is regularly found. Level II offenders MAY NOT be the subject of general public notification. "MODERATE RISK"
* Level III: Relevant, accurate, and necessary information concerning Level III offenders MAY BE disclosed to the public at large. "HIGH RISK"
A Sex offender can not live 1000 ft from a school.
"The Walsh family soon began a campaign to help missing and exploited children. Despite bureaucratic and legislative problems, John and Revé's efforts eventually led to the creation of the Missing Children Act of 1982 and the Missing Children's Assistance Act of 1984." the reason why the Walsh family got so involved is due to there child getting kidnapped and murdered. On July 26, 2006, George W. Bush sign into law The Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act.
Back to the difference between ethnicity. This will probably make me sound like and asshole, but I need to say it. Regardless of what ethnicity a person is i believe any case should be looked into the same way despite if someone is privileged or not privileged. Why does the news make a big thing about a white child who gets kidnapped then that of a Hispanic/ Latino/African American child. If we look at the same situation such as the Haiti earthquake we had American missionaries go and kidnap or say there were "try to help the children of Haiti" in actuality they were taking children who were unwilling to come, to the United States but they get off with a slap on the hand and a big story is made out of it. the things that people don't realize is that in Juarez, Mexico across of the boarder of El Paso 1990-2000 they found mass graves about 4000 bodies of different women.