Teen runaways. Exasperated adults who don’t want to be found. A couple who were brutally murdered years ago but whose bodies never were located.
Nebraska’s missing-persons list contains the names of 571 people, but the list is a mixture of people newly reported missing, cold cases and, likely, people long dead. An average of 22 people are added to the list every day.
Most of the people return safely within days. But some disappear without a trace.
Very few cases generate the national attention as that of 24-year-old Sydney Loofe, who was reported missing Nov. 16 and whose body was found Dec. 4. Officials suspect foul play in her death.
State officials are hoping to improve the list and the way it’s compiled and updated.
Law enforcement authorities say they know it has limitations.
“The problem is volume,” said Omaha Police Capt. Michele Bang. “We count on the fact that most of them are going to be found. Which one’s going to be the needle in the haystack that’s the one that we should be focusing on?”
Officials seeking to determine whether a missing person is in danger must analyze abnormal behavior, family history and risk factors such as age, mental health and circumstances of the disappearance.
Law enforcement agencies must enter missing-persons cases into a national database hours after they receive a credible report, Bang said. Officers put out broadcasts on police radios or see if an Amber Alert is necessary. The case of a 5-year-old who may have been abducted carries more weight than that of an adult who may have chosen to cut ties with family and friends.
The Nebraska State Patrol hosts the central missing-persons website for the state.
The Missing Persons Clearinghouse was created on National Missing Children’s Day — May 25, 2005 — when state legislators passed a bill known as Jason’s Law.
Jason Jolkowski, then 19, disappeared outside his Omaha home on June 13, 2001. He was walking to meet a co-worker for a ride to work. He still has not been found.
Two civilian workers for the patrol manually enter missing-persons cases that they receive either through the national missing-persons database or direct communication with law enforcement.
“It’s a single place the public can go and get information about all missing persons in Nebraska and receive information with credibility,” said Sgt. Richard Aldag with the patrol.
Because cases often are canceled so quickly, the list is constantly changing. The 571 people who were on the list Friday had been reported missing by 82 law enforcement agencies.
This year the patrol has entered more than 7,600 reports, and 80 percent have been juveniles. Nearly just as many have been cleared.
The list contains some recognizable names.
The person who has been missing the longest is Leslie Arnold, the Omaha teen who killed his parents and escaped from prison roughly a decade later, on July 15, 1967.
Even though there have been murder convictions in connection with some of the missing-persons cases, if the person’s body is not found, the person still is considered missing.
Vanderlei Szczepanik, Jaqueline Szczepanik and their 7-year-old son, Christopher, were killed by Jose Oliveira-Coutinho on Dec. 17, 2009. After Oliveira-Coutinho told police he dumped the bodies in the Missouri River, a diver found Christopher’s remains. But Vanderlei and Jaqueline remain on the list because their bodies haven’t been recovered.
Peru State College student Tyler Thomas of Omaha last was seen on Dec. 3, 2010. She still is listed as missing even though authorities in October charged Joshua Keadle with murder in connection with her disappearance.
“You want to leave those cases open in case their remains are found elsewhere,” the manager who oversees the list said.
Some names also may have remained on the list because of an error or oversight. The patrol relies on the reporting agency to say whether a formerly missing person has been found.
One example: A 28-year-old Lincoln woman had been listed on the patrol’s missing-persons database since Oct. 22. But the woman was charged Nov. 20 in Lancaster County with drug possession and appeared in court Dec. 8.
After a reporter asked the patrol and the Lincoln Police Department about the entry, the woman’s name was removed from the database.
The patrol said Lincoln police submitted the case through a form, but never notified the patrol about the cancellation. Officer Angela Sands, a spokeswoman for the Lincoln Police Department, said, however, that according to department records, Lincoln police never entered the woman’s name into the national missing-persons database because officials weren’t worried for her safety. Lincoln police canceled a “missing” notification on Oct. 26.
Aldag said the patrol is looking at automating the list, which would eliminate discrepancies and immediately update it as law enforcement agencies make changes. Officials have a meeting planned for January to talk with developers and figure out how to fund the switch. Currently, if someone is reported missing over the weekend, that person’s name won’t appear on the list until Monday.
With automation, Aldag said, “we can turn it down to a matter of hours, from when the report comes in, populated and available for the public.”
The advantage of the state’s list over social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter is that the information is vetted through authorities.
Misinformation was spread online when Loofe was missing, Sands said.
One person created a flyer of photos of other recent missing Lincoln women, incorrectly suggesting that they were linked to Loofe’s case.
“It was creating a false narrative of an epidemic of missing women in Lincoln,” Sands said. “The media attention came around the Sydney Loofe case because there were suspicious circumstances from the get-go on hers where there wasn’t in the other cases.”
Law enforcement officials also have benefited from information posted on social media concerning a person’s recent whereabouts or last known contacts, said Bang of the Omaha Police Department.
Many of the people on the list are teen runaways who soon will return home, but that doesn’t mean authorities think they shouldn’t be on the list. Juveniles who spend nights on the street or in unfamiliar places easily could end up in trouble, officials say.
“Kids might be more savvy or may have a wider net of places they may go ... but where they’re not savvy is recognizing the danger that they’re putting themselves in,” Bang said. “They don’t necessarily understand it, and that’s what makes them easy to be victimized.”
