Stranger Danger – Report attempted abductions ASAP!

News Update:

Something is definitely amiss when police in Spain and Portugal are coming together to take a closer look at the case of seven year old Jeremy Vargas, who went missing from outside his home in Gran Canaria, Spain eight weeks before Madeleine McCann according to this report here, here and here. The search has reached the stage where they are diving for Maddie’s body in a reservoir here, here, here and here as Portugal’s top cop admits that they blundered in their hasty accusations of the McCanns here and here. Parents going to foreign lands on holiday with young children in tow should beware as the torment of losing a child to only God knows what horrors will never be worth that one relaxing dinner with friends.  

 

Please watch this really eye-opening Australian videoclip (source here) on how easy it is for children to expose themselves to the danger of abduction by strangers. Despite being taught not to open doors when home alone or leave the car to help a stranger, they still do it anyway and it does not take much to coax them into it. Imagine the danger they face walking to and from school or at the playground? I shudder at the thought! I hope police are following up leads on attempted child abductions that may have happened recently, in the run up to both Nini’s and Nurin’s abductions. The Police should also start issuing warnings to the public about stranger dangers and to begin public awareness messages aimed at parents, teachers and schoolchildren on how to avoid being victims. Failure to be on the alert may mean another Nurin or Nini and that is certainly not what we want!

In my frustration while awaiting good news about Nini, I continue surfing for more information and I find that the world has become a strange and terrifying place with more and more news reports of missing children. But I get the feeling there is more to these foiled abductions than meets the eye. Since Nurin and Nini, I have been wary that maybe many of such reports are not taken seriously enough by both the public and police. Have there been many in the run up to both Nurin’s and Nini’s abductions and in which areas or parts of the city? Aside from the child victims of the ‘lelaki kucing”, how many more near misses are we looking at I wonder? A new commentor, Rita Ho, who lives in the US with her husband David, writes on her blog “I’m Making Notes” ( http://ritaho.blogspot.com ) about her own near miss, Rita writes:

Children are taught to be kind & helpful to others but distrustful & careful of strangers at the same time. It is a difficult concept for kids to grasp. Even adults don’t always make that distinction easily. We fall victims to deception all the time as I almost did some 5 years ago. The circumstances weren’t drastic but the realization of what could have happened remains stuck in my mind…..

There is even a report here in the Malay Mail from a parent who wrote

Narrow escape for children
Dear Editor,

ON Jan 29, my mother took my two sons, aged five and one, to a sundry shop in Taman Shamelin to buy news papers.  My mother decided to walk as the shop is nearby. During their journey, they had to pass five houses. While walking with my children, she could hear the sound of a motorcycle coming up behind them. When the motorcycle approached them, my mother saw the motorcyclist and a woman sitting behind him. My mother described him as a thin man and the woman had fair skin. He stopped in front of them and asked her: “Ada kerja? (Got any thing to do?).” My mother shook her head indicating that she did not want to have anything to do with him. To her horror, the man took a piece of wood and stepped down from his motorcycle. He moved nearer and aimed the wooden plank at my mother’s head. He pointed to my sons and shouted “Kasi! Kasi! (Give! Give!).” The man wanted to abduct my sons. Instinctively, my mother shouted “Jangan! Jangan! (No! No!)” and tried to shield her grandsons from the blow. The kidnapper’s accomplice sat on the motorcycle waiting for the kidnapper’s orders. Out of desperation, my mother ran to nearby houses screaming for help. Her action frightened the would-be kidnapper and the couple took off on the motor cycle. After my mother related the incident to me, we immediately lodged a report at the Pandan Indah police station. I am grateful my sons had made a narrow escape. I hope this letter will shed some light on the likelihood of abduction. Parents should take precautions for the safety of their children. Through this incident, I can relate to the recent abduction cases.I hope society will learn from this and do its best to protect children from kidnappers. I thank God for protecting my sons.

Amarjit Singh
Taman Cheras Indah

What I am glad to note is that both Rita and Amarjit did lodge a police report. Would Malaysian police accept these kinds of reports or do they discourage them as the child was not taken. I do hope the IGP will instruct all police officers to take reports of attempted abduction just as seriously as any child abduction. There could be an answer in such abduction attempts that might connect the dots in this increasingly dim chance of finding Nini. Although I am temporarily assured by Bernama’s report “Sharlinie Still Alive And In Malaysia – Police“, I still wonder if the police are just guessing?

“We have not received any report or evidence of her body being found anywhere… so we take it that she’s still alive,” Petaling Jaya district police chief ACP Arjunaidi Mohamad told reporters here today. He said police also believed that the missing girl was still in the country as it had not received any information from Interpol to indicate otherwise. “We believe that Sharlinie’s abductor is being extra careful now with regards to his movements or actions as he is aware of the massive operation being mounted to find the girl.” He said based on this premise, police would continue searching for Sharlinie with a number of strategies planned. “We will not reveal the strategies to the public nor the media. If we talk about them everyday, it will interfere with our investigations and give more opportunities for the abductor to escape the dragnet,” he added.”

But I am concerned with another recent Bernama report here:

Police have no plans yet to engage any foreign intelligence help to find five-year-old Sharlinie Mohd Nashar who has been missing since Jan 9. Selangor police chief DCP Datuk Khalid Abu Bakar said it was still too early to do so as the operations to find the missing girl also involved Malaysian Interpol. “We have a credible Interpol team and there are no plans to enlist the services of any foreign intelligence agency in the immediate future. “The Interpol service is sufficient. Maybe police will use the services of another intelligence agency if really necessary,” he said after opening a crime-prevention campaign at the Seri Kembangan multipurpose hall, near here, today. Khalid said in the absence of new information on the case, police were unable to do any specific follow-up….

PS – I also would like to thank blogger Wahdi who originally came up with the photofits of Sharlinie in his blog ( www.wahdi.blogspot.com ) and blogger AnnKanni ( http://blog.annkanni.com/ ) for alerting me about it. I am so grateful that blogosphere is populated with great bloggers who are equally great people like you guys. Cheers!