Columnist Sandy Thompson: Attorney focuses on missing children cases

Sandy Thompson

Friday, June 29, 2001 | 4:29 a.m.

Sandy Thompson is vice president/associate editor of the Las Vegas Sun. She can be reached at 259-4025 or e-mail at thompson@lasvegassun.com

IS THE TRANSIENT nature of Las Vegas spawning a haven for parents who have kidnapped their children?

Although there are no hard-and-fast statistics, the Nevada attorney general's office says a "high number" of children abducted by their noncustodial parents in other states are found here.

These parents pass through or live here because it's easy to earn a quick buck in service-related jobs that pay cash and/or extra money from tips. Las Vegas also is appealing because of the availability of weekly motels. People can move from place to place to avoid a great deal of notice.

Last year about 750,000 missing children's cases (more than 2,000 a day) were reported to police across the country, according to FBI statistics. They include runaways, abductions (family and stranger) and other mysterious circumstances.

In Nevada last year there were 349 missing children reports, of which 229 were parental abductions. The actual number of missing children is higher because one report may involve several children in the same family. The numbers were down from 492 reports in 1999, of which 276 were parental abductions.

The number of reported runaways last year in Nevada was 6,657, of which more than half were in Metro Police's jurisdiction. The figure, down from 7,183 in 1999, doesn't include "throwaways" -- kids kicked out of their homes by their parents.

"With our transient population, so many kids end up here," attorney Lillian Sondgeroth says.

Sondgeroth recently was honored with a proclamation from Gov. Kenny Guinn for her work on 40 parental abduction cases. She represents the custodial party pro bono and covers the costs through the end of the case.

Sondgeroth approaches her 25-year law career -- and life -- with the belief that each adult should watch out for children, and that the community must put children first.

Her greatest sense of accomplishment comes from reuniting a parent and child. Sondgeroth and James Kimsey, her office manager and a paralegal, recently reunited a father with the son he hadn't seen in two years. In a high-profile case last year in Henderson, Sondgeroth and Kimsey located Melissa, an 8-year-old girl whose father had taken her from her mother in Mexico. The girl and her mother are doing well in Mexico, Sondgeroth says.

Although chances of recovering a child drop dramatically 24 hours after an abduction, Sondgeroth doesn't give up hope in any case. Melissa, for example, was missing for seven years.

It was Melissa who gave Sondgeroth an idea for sharing that spirit of hope with other children. On their way to the airport to return to Mexico, Melissa asked about a handwoven object hanging in Sondgeroth's car. The attorney explained that it was a dream catcher, which, according to Native American legend, chases away bad dreams. Usually placed above one's bed, it allows good dreams to slip through the center hole onto the sleeper below. The bad dreams get tangled in the web where they "melt away in the morning sun."

Melissa remarked that she could use a dream catcher to chase away her bad dreams. So Sondgeroth gave it to her. Seeing the girl's delight, the attorney decided to buy a bunch from Indians in Arizona and donate them to abused and neglected children at Child Haven. She was touched by letters from the children, thanking her for bringing them "good luck and taking away my bad dreams."

"The more you believe in something, the more it will work," she says.