Bill wants parent told ASAP about absent child

A newly pre-filed bill seeks to require schools to immediately notify parents or legal guardians of absent students, instead of waiting for the second or third day of absence to help speed up rescue efforts for missing children. This comes in the wake of the disappearance of sisters Faloma and Maleina Luhk.

Rep. Teresita Santos (Ind-Rota) is set to formally introduce in today’s session House Bill 17-200, or “The Faloma and Maleina Parent Notification of 2011.”

Santos said her bill is important “especially knowing how critical time factors in the recovery of children when they go missing.”

The bill seeks to add a new subsection to the Commonwealth Code. The proposed new subsection reads: “If a child is absent and the school has not been notified, a member of the office staff shall contact the parent or legal guardian on the first morning. If there is no answer at home, the emergency number or the parent or legal guardian’s place of business or work will be called in an attempt to reach the parent or legal guardian.”

Currently, schools wait for the third day of absence before calling or notifying parents or legal guardians of absent students.

The Luhk sisters, both students at Kagman Elementary School, have been missing since May 25. Police said witnesses reported seeing the sisters at past 6am that day near their house in As Teo while waiting for their school bus that was supposed to pick them up at 6:30am.

The sisters did not make it to the bus and missed class. Their grandparents and relatives only learned that the girls were missing when they failed to return home after school around 3:30pm.

The grandparents filed a missing persons report with the Department of Public Safety at 5:30pm—over 11 hours after they were reportedly last seen.

Santos, in her bill, said in most missing children cases worldwide, “time is an important factor.”

“When a child is taken, the two days following the abduction are what is the most important. If a child is taken and recovered within the following 48 hours, the child has a better chance of being found alive.

“However, after 48 hours have passed, the chance is much lower that the child will be found alive, or that they will be found at all,” Santos said.

DPS and the FBI continue to monitor “classified leads” in the disappearance of Faloma, 10, and Maleina, 9.

Despite the $50,000 cash reward for information on the Luhk sisters, tips and leads have dried up, according to the FBI.