FBI: More than 1,100 'active' missing-persons cases in Tennessee; exact number unknown
The car of Megan Maxwell was discovered in flames April 26 by the side of U.S. Highway 25/70.In the early-morning hours of April 26, Megan Maxwell drove to her father's home in Newport to check on him. From there, at 4:27 a.m., she called a friend to say all was OK and she would return home after finishing a cigarette.
About 90 minutes later, Newport Police Officer Derek Wright headed home after working a night shift. He came upon a car fully engulfed in flames on Highway 25/70 about six miles east of town.
The red 2001 Mitsubishi was Maxwell's. But there was no sign of the 19-year-old girl with bright hazel eyes and a wide, radiant smile.
She has not been seen or heard from since that early- morning phone call.
Every year, more than 750,000 missing-persons reports are filed with police agencies in the United States. Megan Maxwell became one of more than 1,100 reported missing in Tennessee this year as of May 1.
Most will turn up unharmed. Many were on a lark or a binge. Others fled to escape abuse or avoid responsibility. Some wandered off because they were confused or infirm. Some children are taken in custody disputes. Some missing persons do not want to ever be found.
But tens of thousands never return, as if they have blended into the wind. University of North Texas DNA Identity Laboratory Director Arthur Eisenberg has called this "America's silent disaster."
An unknown number of them are victims of crimes. And some of them have involuntarily acquired a new identity - John or Jane Doe, hastily scribbled on a yellow toe tag in a morgue far from home.
The FBI began keeping statistics on missing-persons in 1975. By the end of 2008, there were 102,764 missing- persons cases listed as "active" in the FBI's National Crime Information Center (NCIC) database. Almost half of those - 51,054 - were under the age of 18. Another 12 percent were between the ages of 18 and 20.
Tennessee has 1,107 of those active cases.
This year the U.S. Justice Department launched the final component of a new system designed to solve some of the mysteries of the missing in the United States.
Still, it can be difficult to find someone who has disappeared.
Few states have laws that mandate how police agencies should handle missing persons reports, according to the National Institute of Justice. Individual police departments have wide discretion in how to handle missing adult reports, including when - and even if - they will accept one.
Tennessee law does not address missing adults, but mandates that police agencies send the TBI copies of all reports of missing persons under age 21.
"It is literally not possible" for most police agencies to fully investigate every missing person case it receives, said Kenna Quinet, associate professor at the Indianapolis campus of Indiana University and Purdue University who has studied missing persons cases and serial murder. "There are too many of them, and not that many missing persons detectives."
Filing a report
It was the circumstances of Megan Maxwell's case that launched an immediate police investigation.
"In Megan's case, it was obvious from the start (that something was wrong)," Newport Police Chief Maurice Shults said. "But if that burned car had not been found - and given her age - we might not have gone with a full-tilt investigation right away."
Law enforcement officers, private organizations and volunteers have searched woods, river banks, rock quarries. On June 13, a Hamblen County landfill was searched.
In the meantime, Jeffrey Lee Stock, 41, of Del Rio, was arrested on federal charges of not registering as a convicted sex offender. He has been questioned in the case but not charged. Shults will only say that investigators from his department and the Cocke County Sheriff's Office are looking at "several" leads and angles.
Without some indication of foul play or endangerment, Shults and other law enforcement officers say, the report of a missing adult doesn't draw the attention that Maxwell's case has.
Federal law mandates that all law enforcement agencies accept reports of any missing person under 21 years of age, and file those reports with NCIC. But it's a different story with adults.
It's not a crime for an adult to disappear of his or her own choosing. A disappearance is not in and of itself evidence of a crime.
"They can decide to just go away for lots of different reasons," said Lt. Clyde Cowan, head of the Knox County Sheriff's Office Major Crimes Unit. "We have located some who said they didn't want to go back, didn't even want (the person who filed the report) to know where they are."
If such a person is 18 or over, Cowan said, KCSO will notify the family that the person was found, but will not disclose where.
Shults said his department sometimes waits 24 hours before accepting an adult missing persons report, if there is no indication of foul play or endangerment. But he said that is not required, and each situation is judged individually.
Many people mistakenly believe there is a law that police can't take a missing persons report for at least 24 hours. That myth persists largely because of TV shows, Cowan said.
In a highly publicized 1999 Knox County case, Larry Meyer's wife waited 24 hours to report him missing because she thought the law required it, Cowan recalled. Meyer, 68, was eventually found hanging in a wooded area. The death was ruled a suicide.
Though their procedures differ in some ways, KCSO and the Knoxville Police Department both say they will accept a report without delay, and have it reviewed by a trained investigator.
"A lot of times, by the time we get all that done, the person has already returned or been found," Cowan said. If not, the report is usually entered in NCIC, even if there is sparse or no indication of foul play or endangerment.
"You don't want to be the one who didn't enter a report, and have it later turn out to be an abduction or a murder," KPD Capt. Gary Holliday said.
But unlike missing children reports, it is not mandatory that adult cases be entered into NCIC. That decision is entirely up to the agency with which the report was filed.
Matching reports with remains
This year, the U.S. Justice Department launched the third and final stage of its National Missing and Unidentified Persons System, or NaMus. Initiated in 2007, it is designed to foster comparison between a comprehensive database containing information about missing persons cases and another containing information about unidentified human remains in morgues around the country.
The missing persons database will also have a separate section accessible by law enforcement agencies, where investigators can include information they do not wish made public.
Many police agencies are just now learning of NAMUS and its free availability to them, said Todd Matthews of Livingston, Tenn., who is Southeast regional director for the project.
"We are hoping that law enforcement will use this as an investigative tool, and that getting this information to the public may provide some tips or leads for law enforcement," Matthews said.
Though most police agencies today pay better attention to missing persons cases than in the past, there is still room for improvement, says Dr. Steven Egger, a criminologist and professor at the University of Houston at Clear Lake.
"The problem with adult and even teenage missing persons cases is that unless you have a large police department with a section or investigator designated to deal with them, a lot of them can fall by the wayside," said Egger, a recognized authority on serial killers who has also studied missing persons cases.
Egger said he has found that some agencies are still less than attentive to reports of teenagers, and even pre-teens who go missing, because so many of them are runaways who quickly return or are repeat runaways.
Egger said he would like to see states adopt a uniform policy and system of handling missing persons reports and interagency sharing of them.
"Missing persons are of interest to me because I maintain that a number of them who are never found may well be victims of serial killers," Egger said. "But who knows how many?"
'Impossible to know'
There's another "How many?" question that cannot be answered: How many missing persons are there?
In 2008, there were 778,161 missing persons cases filed with NCIC. The 102,764 cases still listed as "active" includes those initially reported in previous years. NCIC began keeping missing persons reports in 1975.
Even though NCIC received cancellation notice in 2008 of 745,088 reports, that also includes many that were filed in previous years, said FBI spokesman Paul Bresson.
Not only do local police not have to enter missing adult reports in NCIC, they are not always told when someone who has been reported missing resurfaces.
Additionally, the FBI does not know if it is receiving all reports of missing juveniles as the law requires, Bresson said.
"It is impossible to know for certain that every single record that is supposed to be entered has been entered," Bresson said. "But we regularly meet with and train police agencies about this system."
Missing-persons reports filed with FBI in 2008*
In Tennessee
- Filed: 12,620
- Canceled: 12,415
- Still active: 205
Active Knox County cases for 2008 - 15
- Younger than 18: 10
- 18 and older: 5
- Male: 7
- Female: 8
- White: 9
- Black: 6
Active Knoxville cases for 2008 - 14
- Younger than 18: 9
- 18 and older: 5
- Male: 6
- Female: 8
- White: 8
- Black: 6
*Law enforcement agencies generally notify the FBI of all active missing-persons reports, but they have the option of not doing so if the person is 21 or older. Also, families don't always promptly notify local agencies when a missing person returns.
Source: FBI's National Crime Information Center
Jim Balloch can be reached at 865-342-6315.
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