History
In 1979 six year old Etan Patz disappeared from a New York street corner on his way to school. He was never seen again. Two years later six-year old Adam Walsh was abducted from a Florida shopping mall and found brutally murdered.
These horrific crimes gripped the hearts and minds of the nation and inspired America’s missing children’s movement.
The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children was created by President Ronald Reagan in 1984. It is a private, 501(c )(3), non-profit organization that works in partnership with the U.S. Department of Justice.
Today we are the nation’s leading organization addressing the problems of missing and exploited children.
Missing Children
Every day 2,000 children are reported missing. Every year 200,000 children are taken by family members, and 58,000 children are the victims of non-family abductions. The vast majority are recovered quickly. However, each year more than 100 kids are the victims of the most serious abductions, like Adam Walsh.
Located outside the nation’s capital with headquarters in Alexandria, Virginia, NCMEC operates a 24 hour, toll free hotline, 1(800)THE LOST. Mandated by Congress, it was established as the national resource to report missing children. It handles more than 700 calls a day. Since 1984, we have assisted in the recovery of more than 110,000 children.
One out of six missing children is recovered through our national photo distribution network.
We play an important role in helping law enforcement build cases through case analysis work. When a case breaks and law enforcement needs our help, we provide on-the-ground support with Team Adam, a rapid response team of highly skilled retired law enforcement agents. We also quickly distribute AMBER Alerts to Internet service providers and cell phone companies to aid in the search.
When a child has been missing for a long time, our Forensic Imaging Unit uses the latest technology to create an age progression or facial and skull reconstruction, to help generate new leads. Today more than 700,000 missing children have been recovered in cases that used age progression. No case is ever closed at NCMEC. Our Cold Case Unit works cases that others may have filed away or forgotten.
Sexual Exploitation of Children
We also work to protect America’s children from sexual exploitation. Statistics show 1 in 5 girls and 1 in 10 boys will be sexually victimized before they are 18. And there is another shocking number. 1 in 7 children are solicited online for sex. Sexual predators are exploiting the Internet to victimize children. But we are using the Internet to fight back!
Our CyberTipline is the 911 of the Internet. It is the nation’s central reporting system for sexual exploitation crimes against children. It has processed more than 465,000 leads which have resulted in thousands of arrests and successful prosecutions.
Child pornography on the Internet has become a multi-billion dollar business. We are seeing a pattern in which children that are being victimized are getting younger and that the images are more violent. Our Child Victim Identification Program is the national hub for storing and analyzing millions of child pornography images.
Last year, we launched the Financial Coalition Against Child Pornography and joined forces with the nation’s leading banking and financial companies in an effort to cut off the source of the money.
Law Enforcement Training
NCMEC also plays a major role in training state and federal law enforcement officers, prosecutors and health care personnel. At the end of 2006, more than 223,000 professionals had been trained at our training center.
Community Outreach
We also operate many community outreach programs, such as NetSmartz, a fun, free interactive online children’s program that teaches Internet safety.
Laws that Protect Children
When the laws need to be toughened to protect children – we lend our support and expertise. Most recently, we worked with John Walsh to get the historic Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act passed in 2006.
The Act creates a nationwide sex offender database so law enforcement can keep track of offenders. Today, there are more than 600,000 registered sex offenders in the United States, but at least 100,000 are noncompliant and no one knows where they are.
As a result of the new Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act, NCMEC a new Special Analysis Unit has just been created at NCMEC to help the U.S. Marshals track down these fugitive sex offenders.
Unexpected Directions
Sometimes our mission takes us in unexpected directions. When Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast, we were asked to get involved. Working around the clock, we reunited all 5,192 children who became separated from their families.
As a result of that success, we have been designated as the lead organization for locating missing children in the event of a future disaster.
The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children – established in the aftermath of tragedy more than 20 years ago – has grown to become America’s leading organization for keeping children safe – making a real impact on millions of lives across the nation.
