MAILE Alert system Tip Gilbert says he never got over the abduction and murder of 6-year-old daughter Maile in 1985.
goes online Dec. 20
TV, radio and road messages
will warn of a child abductionBy Leila Fujimori
lfujimori@starbulletin.com"You learn to live with it, but some days it's just as fresh as the day she was taken," he said.
But Gilbert takes comfort in knowing that his efforts for the past 17 years have finally paid off in a program to activate urgent bulletins in serious child abduction cases.
On Dec. 20 the new MAILE Alert program will begin, using radio and television bulletins and electronic highway billboards to alert the public of abducted children. The program was named after Maile Gilbert.
"I'm just very pleased with HPD and what they've done, and the people that have put this together are doing a fantastic job," Gilbert said.
"I believe that in a situation where there's an abduction, that what they have in store for the program would significantly reduce the chances of not getting that child back," Gilbert said. "It's a good thing."
MAILE (Minor Abducted in Life-threatening Emergency) Alert is the product of a joint effort by local broadcasters and state and city agencies, including the Honolulu Police Department and Oahu and state Civil Defense.
Gilbert was reluctant to say whether the system would have worked to save his daughter, who was abducted by an acquaintance attending a party at a Kailua home in August 1985. James Lounsbery is serving a life sentence for the murder.
"Hard to say. The circumstances were very rare," he said. "Thank God, in Hawaii child abductions are very rare. In case they do happen, it would be nice to have this program."
The system will be used only in the most serious child abductions by strangers and not for custodial interference or runaway cases unless the child is in danger of serious bodily injury or death, said Detective Phil Camero of HPD's Missing Persons Division.
The system is patterned after the AMBER (America's Missing: Broadcast Emergency Response) Plan used across the mainland and created in 1996 as a legacy to Amber Hagerman, 9, who was kidnapped while riding her bicycle in Arlington, Texas, and murdered.
AMBER alerts are used in 29 states at 77 local, statewide and regional levels and are credited with recovering 40 children.
Finding an abducted child quickly can mean the difference between life and death.
"The first three hours are critical because about 74 percent of children abducted are murdered within the first three hours," said Carol Hee, coordinator of Missing Child Center Hawaii.
Child abduction by strangers is not a big problem in Hawaii, Hee said.
"We just want to be prepared," she said. "Personally, it is comforting to me knowing that everybody would be involved in helping to find the child."
The center reported four abductions by strangers of the 540 child kidnapping cases reported since 1994.
The most recent stranger abduction in Hawaii involved an 8-year-old Kalihi girl on May 17 by a man who burglarized her home.
The girl was sexually assaulted but later escaped and ran home, police said.
