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Faces of the missing

By Gavin Phipps
STAFF REPORTER
Sunday, Apr 20, 2003, Page 17

GRAPHIC: TT

There were 17,667 missing persons cases on the National Police Administration's (NPA, 內政部警政署) books in December last year. After a first quarter campaign by the NPA's Missing Persons Task Force (查尋失蹤人口指導組), established on Jan. 20 this year, a considerable dent had been made in these figures. At a press conference in mid-March, the Minister of the Interior, Yu Cheng-hsien (余政憲), lauded the NPA for its efforts in closing 8,555 missing persons files nationwide.

These results aside, the police record for dealing with missing person cases has not been without criticism. Many people in organizations dealing with missing people feel a long-term government effort would be more effective than one well-publicized campaign.

"I'll admit that until the mid-1990s there were problems relating to our processing of missing persons cases," recalled Wu Kuo-liang (吳國樑), head of the NPA's Department of Household Registration. "Before that time we didn't have a centralized computer database of missing persons. This obviously created a lot of problems and led to our being criticized for inefficiency," Wu said.

The NPA's centralized computer database of missing persons was set up in 1993, and in 1998 the police started posting photographs and information regarding missing persons on its Web site, www.npa.gov.tw.

For a nation that boasts a population upwards of 23 million, the number of missing persons cases that land on the desks of both the police and the many privately funded organizations up and down the country are relatively small. The accepted explanation is the conservative social behavior of families in Taiwan.

"To have any people at all going missing is a terrible thing, but society in Taiwan is close-knit and we're very family-oriented. I think, in many ways, this explains why the number of missing persons cases appears small when compared to other parts of the world," said the NPA department chief.

On average, 800 people are reported missing annually. And while the vast majority of these are handicapped and mentally ill people above the age of 18, as well as the elderly, thousands of children also go missing every year. To date, the figure for those between the ages of 12 and 18 reported missing stands at 3,224, while the number of children under the age of 12 is 423.

"There is likely to be some discrepancy between the figures and the actual situation," explained Huang Kuo-bin (黃國賓) of the NPA's Public Information Office (內政部警政署公共關係室). "There are those people who don't want to be found, especially in cases of family break ups when one parent leaves their partner, taking their child and the spouse reports them missing."

Long way to go

The NPA's efforts earlier this year might have reunited hundreds of families with their loved ones, but the number of unsolved missing persons cases in Taiwan currently stands at 13,887, including cases that date back almost 30 years.

"Two years ago we managed to get a law that required a 24-hour waiting period before persons could be reported missing. There are now no time restrictions on when a person can officially be listed as missing," said Chen Wei-ping (陳維萍), director of the League of Welfare Improvement for Older People (LWIOP, 失蹤老人協尋中心). "But I feel there's certainly a lot still to do in regard to the manner in which missing persons cases are handled."

While the campaign was a joint effort by police forces nationwide, one individual was singled out for credit. Tainan police officer, Chang Hsun-teh (張順德), was responsible for locating upwards of 250 missing persons over the past two years. The cases he solved included that of an elderly lady who was missing for 23 years. She had spent 17 years living the life of a homeless vagabond and five in a hospital with authorities unaware as to who she was or if she had a family.

The many flattering remarks given to the campaign by legislators and the media are well deserved, but the campaign and its success have not been without criticism.

"It sounds and looks good, but if such action had been taken before or was simply a matter of protocol then we would see such results on a regular basis," said Chen.

Along with greeting the recent results with some cynicism, those who work for privately-funded, and often under-staffed, organizations feel they are often sidelined by the police rather than helped.

"It would be wrong to say it's a problem across the board. There is certainly a degree of apathy on the part of the police to treat missing persons cases with the same ardor as, say, a robbery or violent crimes," said Chen. "There's no [cash] bonus in locating a missing person."

Opened in October 2001 with backing from the Ministry of the Interior, the LWIOP is staffed by four full-time workers and deals with cases involving mentally ill or handicapped persons over the age of 18.

Funded by the government and with additional financial support coming from individuals and corporations, LWIOP does much of its work through fly-posting large, eye-catching notices with photographs and information regarding missing persons and via its Web site, www.missingoldman.org.tw.

Since being established, the organization has located 355 missing persons. Last year alone the center was responsible for locating 84 missing persons out of a total of 139 cases reported to the center. Sadly it wasn't all good news, as 12 of those found were simply confirmed dead.

"As many of our cases involve elderly people with dementia, and handicapped people, the area in which they are likely to be located is usually within a relatively small radius of their homes," said Chen. "Thankfully it's not always the case, but experience tells us that if they are not located within three days, they are not likely to be found alive."

According to Chen, much of the credit for locating people within the three-day window goes to the general public rather than any single organization.

"Without the public, my job would be impossible. We don't have enough staff and, with the exception of this recent campaign, the police focus most of their effort in other directions."

New tools

While the public certainly plays its part, another factor in the reuniting of missing people with their families is due to a product developed by the LWIOP. In 1998, the LWIOP introduced a silver bracelet with the organization's name and a toll-free phone number etched on it.

Over the past five years, roughly 3,300 LWIOP bracelets have been issued to elderly people across the nation. Of this number 600 recipients of the bracelet have been reported missing at one time or another, and all of them were subsequently reunited with their families.

While the issuing of bracelet to adults has seen remarkable results, Lin Wu-hsiung, (林武雄) director of the Child Welfare League Foundation (CWLF, 中華民國兒童褔利聯盟文教基金會), faces a more daunting and costly task.

Unlike Chen's organization, the CWLF doesn't rely solely on the general public or the police to locate missing children. It distributes a desk calendar with the faces of missing children on it to hospitals and doctors' offices nationwide. It has also been known to hire private detectives.

Results in locating missing children, however, are less than encouraging. Since 1987, the percentage of those located has been less than 50 percent of those going missing each year.

Last year the league located 27 percent of those reported missing, a total of 77 children. "We've got about 1,000 cases still open at present. Over the past five years we have located a total of 283 missing children, 200 of whom were female and 76 percent of whom were aged between 12 and 18 years old," said Lin.

While the recent campaign did see authorities locating a number of children on the Foundation's books, like Chen, Lin believes a long-term increase in resources is necessary if the rate of locating missing persons is to rise.

"Although we get a lot support from media outlets and businesses, since we are a private association our funds and resources are limited. The cost of publishing books and posters and ensuring they are distributed nationwide is a sizable chunk of our budget," continued Lin. "Including me, the foundation only has four full-time social workers to cover the whole of Taiwan."

Although the proportion of missing children located is not high, the cases where the child is discovered dead are relatively few. Last year, nine missing children were found dead, and in the three years Lin has worked for the Foundation, he has only dealt with two such cases.

As for the whereabouts of nine children whose photographs stare forlornly from the yellowing two-year-old missing persons' poster propped up against the wall in his office, Lin shrugged his shoulders, but remained optimistic.

"Obviously, more funds and man power need to be found from somewhere if the results of the recent campaign are to continue," explained Lin. "I believe that the missing children are living happily somewhere in Taiwan. To take any other view would simply prove too upsetting and make my task totally unbearable."
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