Recently, the media has caught attention of a claimed “14 teen girls missing in a 24 hour period.” All of the girls are said to be of Hispanic or African American race. What may seem like a heartbreaking turn of events, may be a prime example of fake news.
It may seem like there are more missing children in Washington, D.C, but that is because the Metropolitan Police Department has changed its strategy in regards to posting missing children on social media. D.C. police officials said they have simply been using Twitter more often to publicize missing person reports.
WJLA reported that the Metro Police Department has always shared some missing persons on social media, but since early this year, the new police commander decided to use Twitter for every critical case. The girls featured in the viral post disappeared over the course of years, and many have been found. So far this year, 95 percent of missing persons cases have been closed.
Another misconception is that these missing girls have been sex trafficked. D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser and D.C. police confirmed they have found no links between these cases and human trafficking. Additionally, many of these girls left home on their own terms, which is why no Amber Alerts have been issued. Commander Dickerson also reported that a large percentage of the missing teens are leaving home voluntarily before returning home on their own accord or being located shortly after.
“We have received a lot of media attention and a lot of concern from the public because of the number of releases,” Dickerson said at a news conference on Friday. “There have been concerns that young girls in the District of Columbia are victims of human trafficking or have been kidnapped, or that there’s an increase in the number” who have gone missing. “And I say this without minimizing the number of missing persons in DC — because one missing person is one person too many — but there’s actually been a decrease,” she added. “There is always a concern of human trafficking, but we have no evidence for this.”
