McCallion
Quest
Child Abductions Make No Place Safe
By: Celia Schepp, Freelance writer
In the early morning hours of June 6 of last year, Elizabeth Smart, a fifteen-year-old Salt Lake City, Utah native, was abducted from her bedroom, one which she shared with her nine-year-old sister, Mary Katherine. Elizabeth and her sister were sound asleep, when all of a sudden a man appeared in their room, threatening to kill them both with his gun. Elizabeth was taken from her room that night and disappeared for 9 months. Police never stopped searching for her and when Ed and Lois Smart, her beloved parents, were prepared to give up, their hopes were lifted when Elizabeth was spotted on a main street in a nearby city. Eventually, thanks to the Utah State Police, she was rescued and was returned to her home, yet law enforcement officials believe that she had been sexually assaulted and maybe even brainwashed.
After her return home, Elizabeth and the team of psychologists that worked with her felt that, to get over what had happened, she had to revisit the location of where her abductors had kept her. Her parents were stunned to see that the site was less than 5 miles away from their home and that, when Elizabeth was still being held captive, she could hear her uncle, who was searching for her, calling her name. She couldn’t reply because at least one of her abductors was with her at all times, and if she were to call out she would be killed. Elizabeth was chained to a tree and was never let off unless they were going somewhere, which she would then be covered from head to toe, in a long white dress and a white blanket, covering her face completely so you could only see her eyes. Although Elizabeth was returned home safely and her abductors, 49-year-old Brian David Mitchell and his wife Wanda Barzee, were captured, not everyone is so lucky.
A local Ontario girl, Holly Jones, was kidnapped just down the street from her home on May 12th 2003, after dropping off her friend. When she didn’t return home by nine o’clock, her parents, Maria Jones and George Stonehouse, began to worry. They contacted police and an “Amber Alert” was issued. An Amber Alert is a quick response strategy used when a child is suspected of being kidnapped.
Sadly, the next morning, there
was to be no happy, reuniting of Holly and her parents. Holly Jones was
pronounced dead when her body parts were discovered in two duffel bags in the
shallow waters of Lake Ontario, off the shore of Ward’s Island. Almost six weeks
after her disappearance police arrested Michael Briere, 35 who lived near
Holly’s home.
After listening to the news and researching these children and their cases, I have become a bit worried whether or not I’m actually safe in my own home. I surveyed my class 8A to see how safe they feel in their homes. Surprisingly, only 55% feel they are completely safe at home. Sadly, 7% said they don’t feel safe at all, and 37% confessed to feeling somewhat safe. Thanks to the cases of Elizabeth Smart, Holly Jones and Cecilia Zhang (who was taken most recently out of her house) we kids now realize that it is possible to be taken from our very own rooms. I always thought that there was no place safer than our homes. Obviously I was wrong. The sad reality of today’s society is that there is really no place that we are safe anymore. That’s what scares me the most. Whatever happened to the times when we left our front door open all night with no worries that something bad would happen? If this is what we can expect to face now as kids, what will our kids be feeling 20 years from now? All I know is that from now on I’m keeping my windows and doors locked and my family is seriously considering getting a security system installed. I never thought it would come to this but after reading and listening to the stories of Elizabeth, Holly and Cecilia, it just goes to show you that you are never ‘totally’ safe…anywhere.
Sources of Information
www.citytv.com
www.canada.com
City Pulse at Six News
Global National News
www.cnn.com