The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC), in partnership with Cass County Sheriff’s Office, will be observing National Missing Children’s Day from 3 to 6 p.m. Friday by participating in the national Take 25 child safety campaign.
A child ID/fingerprinting event, where adults can bring children to be fingerprinted for free by the Cass County Sheriff’s Department and receive a take-home kit, will be held at the Cass District Library, 319 M-62, Cassopolis.
The Take 25 campaign is a national child safety public awareness campaign created in 2007 by the NCMEC. The campaign encourages parents to take 25 minutes to talk to their children about safety and ways to prevent abduction.
Every year in America, an estimated 800,000 children are reported missing, more than 2,000 each day. Of that number, 200,000 are abducted by family members and 58,000 are abducted by non-family members, for which the primary motive is sexual.
Each year, 115 children are the victims of the most serious abductions; they are taken by non-family members and either murdered, ransomed or taken with the intent to keep.
An analysis of attempted abduction cases by NCMEC found that in 84 percent of the cases, the child escaped would-be abductors through their own actions.