National Missing Children’s Day: Find Missing Nashville Kids

NASHVILLE, TN -- Every 40 seconds, the time it takes to heat up a slice of pizza in the microwave, a child is reported missing somewhere in America. Some are runaways, but others are abducted. Most have come home alive, due in part to efforts like those taking place Friday, May 25, on National Missing Children’s Day to reunite kids and their families. In Tennessee, at least 116 children have been reported as missing since 1994.

That’s according to a database kept by the Polly Klaas Foundation that includes the names of more than 9,800 children reported missing from 1994-2017. The foundation is named for the California 12-year-old who was stolen from her home on Oct. 1, 1993, by a knife-wielding intruder who interrupted a children’s slumber party and carried her away. Her body was found nine weeks later, on Dec. 3, 1993.

The actual number of kids who are reported missing every year is hard to calculate, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, established in 1984 to provide a coordinated national approach to find missing kids. Because some children are never reported missing and others, like repeat runaways, are entered in the FBI National Crime Information Center each time they run away, there’s no way to reliably know how many children are missing.

Since its founding nearly 35 years ago, the NCMEC has assisted in the recovery of more than 260,000 children. But some have never been found. Still missing in Nashville, according to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, are these children:

• Jane Doe 1976: On March 24, 1976 the female victim was found in the Harpeth River, dead for less than 24 hours. She is a Caucasian, Hispanic or Native American female between the ages of 14 to 17 years old, found wearing a choker style necklace with beads and a white dove on it. She had a mole on her left temple and old scars on both arms which may have come from cigarette burns. Prior to her death the victim was hitchhiking with another Caucasian female. The girls stated that they were heading to Haines City, Fla. The female companion was described to be around the same age with sandy blonde hair and wore wire rim glasses, but was never located or interviewed. The girls mentioned that they had just ran away from an institution up north that would have treated substance abuse and mental health problems.
• Charlie Hall: Then-15-year-old Charlie Hall was last seen leaving a friend's house on New Year's Eve 1981 and has not been seen since. Charlie has a birthmark on his right cheek. He may go by the name Little Charlie.
• Lakisha Jones: Then 15-years-old, Lakisha Jones was last seen Dec. 15, 1999. She has a scar under her left eye and a tattoo of "C47" on her right thigh. She was last seen wearing a black shirt, green pants, a black jacket, and black shoes. She may be in Nashville or Memphis.
• Tabitha Tuders: Perhaps Nashville's most famous missing child, Tabitha Tuders, then 13, disappeared while walking to her East Nashville middle school. She would be 28.
• Alexis Garcia: Missing since March 27, 2018, 15-year-old Alexis may still be in the local area. She may have highlights in her hair. Alexis is biracial. She is Black and Hispanic. Alexis may go by the nickname Lexi.

The nonprofit National Center for Missing and Exploited Children was established by parents like John and Revé Walsh, whose 6-year-old son, Adam, was abducted from a Florida shopping mall in 1981 and later found murdered.

Before the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children existed, police could enter information about stolen cars, guns and other items on the FBI’s crime database, but not stolen children. The Adam Walsh disappearance was among several tragic cases that illuminated the need for a nationwide, coordinated system to address the problem of missing children.

Others included Etan Patz, a 6-year-old who vanished from a New York street on the way to school in 1979. Over the next several years, 29 children and young adults reported as missing were found murdered in Atlanta, Georgia. In 1982, West Des Moines, Iowa, paperboy Johnny Gosch, 12, never came home from his paper route. His disappearance remains unsolved.

Former President Ronald Reagan was an honored guest when the NCMEC opened its doors in 1984. A year earlier, he had proclaimed every May 25 as National Missing Children’s Day.

Since then, the Department of Justice has annually commemorated National Missing Children’s Day with a ceremony honoring heroic and exemplary efforts of agencies, organizations and individuals to protect children, and to coordinate efforts to reunite missing children with their families.

The problem of missing children is particularly acute in California, which accounts for nearly half of the missing children cases documented on the Polly Klaas Foundation website. The states with the most missing children reports since 1994 are:

California: 4,541
Texas: 489
Florida: 364
Arizona: 246
New York: 223
Washington: 218
Ohio: 209
Colorado: 183
Illinois: 177
Georgia: 171
Oregon: 153
Pennsylvania: 153
Nevada: 150
Michigan: 130
Indiana: 124

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