negligent sheriff dept.

What is the name of your state? TN Not sure what category this post should be in actually.....
On 12/17/97 I filed a missing person report on my son who was 19 and had been missing in LA since early Nov. After I spent hundreds of dollars of phone bills calling everywhere, I was told to file the report locally, that my local authorities would enter the info into the NCIC, the national data base. After all this time, I realize now that the report was not taken seriously, was not entered into the NCIC files, and that there is no chance of ever recovering a body. They did give the info to the local newspaper without my consent, but did nothing more. This is blatant negligence. CAN I SUE THESE MORONS???? What sort of chance would I have going up against a sheriff's department?

Before being so pretentious as to call someone a moron, you should know of what you speak.

If your son is missing from L.A., guess who should investigate the incident????? L.A., not your local department.

Per NCIC regulations, adults can only be entered as missing under certain circumstances. They have to be one of the following:

1. Disabled - They are in personal and immediate danger due to a physical or mental disability.

2. Involuntary - The circumstances appear to be an abduction.

3. Endangered - Other circumstances indicating the person is in immediate danger.

4. Catastrophic - Missing after a catastrophe (earthquake, plane crash, etc)

Your son has every right to simply disappear if he chooses. If the circumstances do not quallify as any of the above, NCIC will not accept the entry.

Therefore, the only one who was negligent here is the moron who told you to file a report with your local SD when your son disappeared from 2,000 miles away.

NCIC

TN
http://www.fas.org/irp/agency/doj/fbi/is/ncic.htm If you read the information at this URL you will possibly grasp that your knowledge on this subject is as lacking as your sense of compassion.
Because of a national database, it is supposed to be rational and convenient for a person to file a missing persons report locally regardless of the area from which the individual is missing. More than one LA authority told me to file the report locally. The fact that my local authorities cannot even find the report clearly shows who the morons are.

Read my post. Go ahead....I'll wait.







Do you understand it?

I never said that yur local Sheriff's Department could not enter your son in NCIC. I am intimately familiar with NCIC regulations, so before you try to insult me try to understand what I wrote. How's tha foot taste?

What I said is that L.A. should investigate the report. How in the hell is your local SD in TENNESSEE supposed to investigate a disappearance from L.A.???? Do you expect them to fly to Kalifornia??????? Since any evidence, witnesses, ect would be in L.A., does it not make sense for Komiefornia authorities to investigate it???

Your local SD cannot do more than enter him into NCIC, and so far you have not provided ANY evidence that he qualifies for entry.

I never intended to appear uncompassionate to your dilemma, but you look like th moron when calling someone a moron for nothing. Your local SD can't do much for you. Anyone with common sense can figure that out.

TN You are missing the point. The LA authorities instructed me to file the report locally, assuming the info would be entered into the national database. No one expected TN officials to go to CA, but how could the CA people do anything without the information? Furthermore, for your information, here is an excerpt from the NCIC qualifications:

C. Missing Persons: 1. A person of any age who is missing and who is
under proven physical/mental disability or is senile, thereby
subjecting that person or others to personal and immediate danger.
2. A person of any age who is missing under circumstances indicating
that the disappearance was not voluntary.
3. A person of any age who is missing under circumstances indicating
that that person's physical safety may be in danger.
4. A person of any age who is missing after a catastrophe.
5. A person who is missing and declared unemancipated as defined by
the laws of the person's state of residence and does not meet any of
the entry criteria set forth in 1-4 above.

Since my son telephoned me the day he disappeared, told me, among other things, that he loved me and looked forward to seeing me in a few weeks, and because among his personal effects were my letters and photos of his family, I do not believe he disappeared intentionally.
All this is moot anyway. My question remains: what are the chances of suing the dept. responsible for entering the data since by not doing so I lost any chance of recovering my son's body???? I would hope for reply from someone actually knowledgable.

I understand that your son can be entered into NCIC if he qualifies. This is the first time you have even attempted to articulate why you feel your son qualifies under those restrictions. Since I actually use the system, and you read regs on the internet, I will tel you that I still don't feel he qualifies. But as you said, this is really a moot point........

From a logical standpoint, it makes more sense for the L.A. authorities to enter the info, as they are (should be) doing the investigation. How do they get the info???? Well.....you give it to them, just as you would your local dept.......

To answer your question...

NO. No, you cannot sue the department. Actually that's not true. You can sue anyone you wish. Whether you can get an attorney to take the case and whether you win or not are different altogether. The Sheriff's Department has no legal obligation ot investigate your son's disappearance.....especially since it happened 2000 miles away!

If you live in my town here in northeast Pennsylvania, and go on vacation to Florida. How is it my responsibility to investigate you disappearing from Florida? Would it be my responsibility to investigate any crime you commit in Florida? Of course not. It's the same thing.

The people at fault here are the ones in L.A. who told you to file it locally. That just means they didn't want to be bothered.

One last thing. I think we have established that you are in Tennessee.....you can stop putting it at the beginning of each post.

you mention not being able to claim his body. do you have any information that he is dead?

lost son

Nothing but death would keep him from contacting me, his girlfriend, his buddies, his sister. He's had a hard time, so I can handle him getting another chance, but what I am not dealing with very well is NOT KNOWING, and especially the fact that the authorities have just jerked me around and never did give a hoot what happened to him. I filed a report here in person and over the phone in CA, but the info never did get entered into the database as I was told it would. My various inquiries over the years (to LA) have been met with BS - comments like, "Oh, the person handling that retired." or "Well, we dropped that case after the mudslides." or "Well, he was a juvenile, but he's not now." The bottom line is no one but me gave a s**t what happened to my son.

Halcyon: I will also venture my $0.02 into this thread with full realization that you may also class me as a "moron" since I disagree with you.

1) Your son does not qualify for NCIC entry. You provided the following excerpt:
"C. Missing Persons: 1. A person of any age who is missing and who is under proven physical/mental disability or is senile, thereby subjecting that person or others to personal and immediate danger.
2. A person of any age who is missing under circumstances indicating that the disappearance was not voluntary.
3. A person of any age who is missing under circumstances indicating that that person's physical safety may be in danger.
4. A person of any age who is missing after a catastrophe.
5. A person who is missing and declared unemancipated as defined by the laws of the person's state of residence and does not meet any of the entry criteria set forth in 1-4 above."
Since you seem so adamant that he qualified for NCIC entry, under which of the above are you basing that??

2) And let me answer your question: "CAN I SUE THESE MORONS????". Based on the information provided in your post, no. The problem here is that the ONLY problem you are citing is that 'someone' told you that he could (or would) be entered into the NCIC in error. That is NOT an actionable offense. And even if it was, the individual and agency involved would be immune to your suit since the information was provided "in their official duties" and was not done with malice or negligence.

Note #2 - missing involuntarily. He qualifies under that stipulation. A local investigator has just taken note of the situation, apologized profusely for the negligent oversight of the sheriff's dept. in not getting the report to the NCIC. and has vowed to take it on himself to interact with the LA authorities and see if we can find out anything.
I believe a distraught mother who has placed her faith in the law enforcement and peace keeping officials has every right to deem individuals inept and incompetent when it is discovered that they were lax in the fulfillment of their duties. The "someones" who told me to file the report locally happened to be authorities in LA at the police and sheriff's depts.

I thought you might try that one.... but from your post, you have NO evidence that his 'disappearance' was NOT voluntary?? There is nothing in your post that supports your contention in any way. The fact that he hasn't communicated, left clothes, etc. does not conclusively mean anything.... it just means that he is missing.

From my previous post: Since my son telephoned me the day he disappeared, told me, among other things, that he loved me and looked forward to seeing me in a few weeks, and because among his personal effects were my letters and photos of his family, I do not believe he disappeared intentionally.
An officer just left my home with a new missing person report. He told me he was very sorry about all this, did not understand why my '97 report had not been entered into NCIC, assured me this one would be entered, reiterated his regret and expressed embarassment for his dept. making a mistake like this, saying he doesn't understand it, but missing persons are "at the bottom of the pile." I emphasized that I did not expect my local SD to investigate this, only to relay the info to NCIC. He said that the interface between the two departments would be much more effective than me trying to contact authorities in LA.
So, I am posting this and will then delete this thread as I see no more point in continuing this conversation.
Thank you.