BELIZE CITY, Tues. July 31, 2018– Jasmine Alert, an early warning system implemented to find abducted or missing children quickly, before they are killed or harmed, celebrated its 6th anniversary today.
The program was created in 2012 in the memory of Jasmine Lowe, 13, a girl scout of Santa Elena, Cayo District.
The last time Jasmine was seen, she was getting into a car. She was reportedly abducted in Santa Elena.
Three days after she disappeared, her lifeless body was found in a pasture in Cristo Rey, Cayo District.
The Jasmine Alert is patterned off the Amber Alert, an early warning system in the United States of America, which partners with the police, phone companies, and other stakeholders in that country to find missing children.
The 6th anniversary of the Jasmine Alert was marked today at the Belize Biltmore Plaza Hotel in a ceremony hosted by Patrick Menzies, the program’s executive director.
Menzies said that he has basically been funding the program over the six years of its existence. At the ceremony, he announced some agreements that had been made with partners, new and old, to help fund the program in the future.
Menzies said that an agreement was signed with 4-Life Rhino, an American organization that has a base in Belmopan. Agreements were also signed with SMART and Digicel phone companies, which handed over phones to Menzies and gave the Jasmine Alert a toll-free hotline (610-5483).
Menzies said that they will now have program coordinators in the schools, and a Whatsapp blog has been formed.
In the event that a child is reported missing from a school, the coordinator will call 911 and send an alert via the Whatsapp blog, and the system will immediately swing into operation to locate the child.
Menzies said that when a child goes missing from his or her home, the parent or guardian should call 911, and then report the matter to the police.
He went on to say that a parent or guardian who feels that the response is too slow should contact Jasmine Alert.
Menzies urges persons making a missing person report to the media to provide a picture of the missing individual, because it makes it easier for the public to assist in the search.