ID Program Designed to Help Find the Missing

publication date: Aug 18, 2008

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author/source: Shannon Alderman / STAFF

By Shannon Alderman / STAFF

What if your child went missing one day? What if you found out your child was one of the 797,500* children (younger than 18) who were reported missing this year? How do you keep your child from becoming part of this growing and troublesome national statistic? Would you have your child’s most up-to-date information ready and available to hand off to authorities to aid in their search? Roger Wise, Roswell resident and Director of Community Relations for the Georgia Child Identification Program (GACHIP), is passionate about getting the word out about a free, state-wide, child identification program that aims to aid authorities in the speedy and safe recovery of Georgia’s missing kids.

PARENTS SAFETY NET
“With the GACHIP pack, a parent has something in Georgia that nobody else has. All the information in this kit can be tied into the national Amber Alert System,” Wise said. “And with the photographs, fingerprints and the dental impression wafer, authorities will have DNA samples, and scent tracking for law enforcement dogs instantly. It is unbelievable.”

GACHIP, sponsored by the Grand Lodge of Georgia Free and Accepted Masons, is not a chip implanted into a child’s arm; rather, the Masons, armed with laptop computers and digital cameras, generate child identification kits at free GACHIP events around the state, including in Roswell and Alpharetta. They take multiple color digital photographs, collect a complete set of digital fingerprints, and other pertinent information about the child, including distinguishing features such as hair and eye color and any scars.  Saliva from the dental impressions can provide a scent that can be used by tracking dogs to help find the lost child.

AN ORWELLIAN SOLUTION?
If this sounds a bit too “big brother” for you, consider that the program is funded by the oft mysterious and secretive Freemasons.  If this has you furrowing your brow, have no fear Wise says.  “The Masons are not building a database to takeover the world,” he said, laughing. “When the parent and child leave a GACHIP event, we clear the computers and all the child’s information is erased from the computer. The parent leaves the event with all the collected information on a CD-ROM.” The process takes twenty minutes or less and Wise said the kit is not to be opened unless the child is reported lost or missing.

BETTER SAFE THAN SORRY
Unleashed in November of 2007 and spearheaded by Ted Collins, Grand Master of the Masons in Georgia, GACHIP already has over 8,000 children in their program.

“Of course, we pray that parents never have to use one of these kits to locate their missing child.” Collins paused. “Unfortunately, one day, they probably will.”


ROSWELL’S EPIDEMIC
In Roswell, of the 117 missing person cases on file from January through August of this year, 79 of those cases were missing children ages 18 and under. Fortunately, Lt. James McGee, commander of the Professional Standards Unit from the Roswell Police Department, said child abductions are not common in North Fulton County.

“Mostly what we see here are runaway cases,” Lt. McGee said.  That is consistent with information obtained from the Georgia Bureau of Investigation. “In the state of Georgia, typically what we see more of here are parental abductions and more custodial issues rather than stranger on stranger cases,” said John Bankhead, Director of Public Affairs for the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

Regardless of whether it is a stranger abduction, a parental abduction or a runaway child case, Wise says GACHIP is a necessary program to safeguarding Georgia’s children, and key politicians, governmental agencies and law enforcement groups are in support of this child identification program. “GACHIP has been endorsed by Governor Sonny Perdue, Lieutenant Governor Casey Cagle, the Georgia Department of Defense and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation,” Wise said. “Georgia is the only state in the region to roll out the program in the Southeast.”

GACHIP EVENTS IN ROSWELL AND ALPHARETTA
In Roswell and Alpharetta, parents and kids have multiple opportunities to get their free GACHIP pack including on September 20 at Alpharetta’s Funfest, and at a two-day open house event in Roswell beginning on Friday, October 24 from 1 p.m. to 6 p.m. and Saturday, October 25 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. That event will be hosted by the Child Development Association (CDA), a non-profit provider of affordable childcare and preschool education for low income working families. The GACHIP event at the CDA is open to all families and all ages are welcome.

For additional information or to view a calendar of upcoming GACHIP events, go to www.gachip.org.

* According to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC), 797,500 children younger than 18 were reported missing in a one-year period with an average of more than 2,100 children reported missing each day.