The Missing working group in Ohio gives 18 recommendations to better examine cases. • Ohio Capital Journal

TThe Ohio Working Group did missing persons 18 recommendations To the legislator, the The Attorney General of Ohio and various nationwide agencies Examine the cases of missing persons better.

Ohio governor Mike Dewine founded the 24-member working group in January after the Columbus shipping had released a series last year about how the police deal with missing persons. The group met six times and Dewine announced the recommendations on Tuesday.

“We believe that from our hearts (the recommendations) the way the state of Ohio deals with reports will improve when someone is missing,” said Andy Wilson, director of public security in Ohio.

According to the Attorney General in Ohio, there was 21,342 Ohioaners in 2024 – including 16,404 children.

One of the recommendations is that the legislator would allow law enforcement to receive a search order to find someone who is missing. In order to currently receive a search order, the law enforcement authorities must claim that a criminal law has taken place and has a probable reason.

“We know for the law enforcement authorities that so much information that you can receive in an early examination will often help to bring the result on a quick solution,” said Wilson. “One of the tools with which law enforcement officers record this information is a search order for records for telephone records, internet data sets or social media records.”

The working group also calls on legislators to increase the penalties for custody interventions, which is currently a crime of the fifth degree.

“Missing children are often missed because of a family member or a parent who has no legal custody of the child, violates this child against custody orders and sometimes brings this child out of the state,” said Wilson.

In some situations, the missing child is taken out of the country, he said.

“In these situations, if you remove the child from the state, it will be very difficult to get the child back, especially if you only have to do with a criminal offense of lower levels,” said Wilson. “If you remove the child out of the country, it should be improved even further because it will be very difficult for law enforcement to get this child back. We believe that this would not only have a deterrent impact on people who take their children and run, but the system would appeal appropriately from a point of view of the judiciary.”

Some of the most tragic cases that Dewine saw were custody cases in which the child was taken out of the country.

“It is extremely difficult for anyone to do something about the child outside the United States' care,” he said. “And everything we can do to increase this punishment is to try to make this more deterrent is certainly something we should do.”

State Reps. Christine Cockley, D-Columbus and Kevin Ritter, R-Marieta, presented a legislative template according to which the law enforcement authorities would enter the information from a missing person in the national missing and unidentified person system.

“We believe with all our hearts that (the) calculation is probably a good vehicle for us to change or add some recommendations from this working group,” said Wilson.

Andy Chapman

Andy Chapman was missing in 2006 and his family has worked since then to bring him home.

“For nineteen years we had hope that Andy would come home, 19 years of worry, heartache, anger, sadness and unimaginable grief,” said his sister Aimee Chapman.

Andy was missing when he was 32 years old, a few years after his life was “turned upside down by addiction” after he had started a car accident, said his sister. He was last seen in Columbus.

Aimee said that the case of her brother had been closed and reopened by several detectives over the years.

“During this entire time we continued to work on behalf of Andy and our family and other families,” she said. “Families are the key to the habits, friends and records of this individual. … to know that these cases are not forgotten is so important for us.”

18 recommendations

1. The General Assembly in Ohio was supposed to codify the criteria for the missing children's alarm from Ohio.
2. Ohio State Highway Patrol should work with the Attorney General for Criminal Investigations to create an automatic procedure in order to inform the required law enforcement authorities from endangered child notifications.
3. The US Ministry of Justice should accelerate the work in order to connect the National Criminal Information Center to the NAMUS database, as is required by the Federal Aid, which finds the lack of law, which is also referred to as Billy's Law.
4. The General Assembly in Ohio was to set up laws in which the law enforcement authorities and the public prosecutor's office of the district prosecutor are authorized to receive search command to collect information and records that can help you find a missing person at high risk.
5. The general assembly in Ohio should set up laws
6. The General Assembly in Ohio should state that disorders with arrest warrant commands in leads and NCIC are entered with a nationwide pick -up radius.
7. The Ohio Office of Criminal Justice Services should expand its reimbursement program for the delivery of Ohio prisoners so that the funds for payment of law enforcement can be used for the costs of returning disorders to Ohio.
8. The General Assembly in Ohio was to set up laws in which the local law enforcement authorities have to digitize unsolved suspicious reports before the destruction of paper files. BCI should also create a digital repository to store the case recordings of missing persons in local law enforcement authorities.
9. The Ohio Peace Officer Training Academy within the General Prosecutor in Ohio should develop advanced training for new investigators and law enforcement authorities for missing persons.
10. The Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services and the Health Ministry of Ohio were to develop a model guideline in which health service providers are set for health care, can legally share with law enforcement officers who examine cases of missing persons.
11. The General Prosecutor's office in Ohio should maintain a central repository with resources for law enforcement authorities and families of missing persons.
12. The General Prosecutor's office in Ohio and the Ohio Department of Public Safety should work together to create educational resources in which it is explained how and when there is a report for missing persons.
13. BCI should build an annual conference for law enforcement agencies and families with missing relatives to work together, share best practice and to raise awareness of missing cases in Ohio.
14. BCI should set up a confidential forum for law enforcement and intelligence analysts who carry out missing persons to discuss techniques, to determine the cooperation with the violations and carry out case examinations.
15. The advisory committee for collaborative community policy board in Ohio should check and revise the law enforcement and model guidelines for missing persons in accordance with the recommendations of this working group.
16. The US office for refugee settlements for health and human services should carry out a process to inform the coordinators of the state refugees in the Ohio Department of Job & Family Services if an unaccompanied minor is placed in Ohio.
17. The Ohio School Safety Center and the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles should work together to raise awareness of the identification card program for children.
18. The Ohio Department of Children and Youth, the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services, the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation and the Office of Criminal Justice Services in Ohio should work with the local law enforcement to develop a pilot program to support supporters who regularly leave their houses or their group settings.

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