Pagers to be used to find the missing

Jace Radke

Tuesday, Sept. 11, 2001 | 9:51 a.m.

A collaboration among law enforcement agencies, missing persons advocacy groups and Metrocall Inc. has resulted in a new program designed to get the word out to local businesses about missing persons through the use of pagers.

The Timely Response And Safe Expedient Recovery Program, or TRASER, is designed to increase the numbers of people looking for missing adults and children. The program is expected to help in locating missing elderly people, especially those suffering from Alzheimer's disease, Metro Sgt. Dan McGrath said.

"We're seeing increases in the number of adults and Alzheimer's patients walking away, and they usually end up in casinos, or on CAT buses," McGrath said.

So far 66 pagers have been donated by Metrocall, one of the nation's largest providers of messaging services, to casinos, taxi cab companies, Citizens Area Transit and shopping malls, Metrocall spokeswoman Julia Lyons said.

"We're giving the pagers to businesses that have 50 or more employees and utilize a dispatch service," Lyons said. "That way whenever police have a report of a missing person they can send out a page with the details and dispatchers can tell their employees what to be on the lookout for."

The program pools the resources of local law enforcement, the Nevada Missing Children Clearinghouse, Nevada Child Seekers, the National Alzheimer's Association and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

"The important thing is that all these groups are working together and collaborating to help find missing people," McGrath said. "The faster we can put out information, whether its through pagers, fliers or the media, the better. Getting the information out to as many people as possible can be the key."

Along with the TRASER program, Metro police also have a new computer system to assist in finding missing persons. The new system is called Locater, and was given to Metro through federal grants from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

"With the new system we can e-mail pictures and information about missing children and adults, and it gives us direct access to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children," McGrath said. "The system utilizes digital imaging, so we have much clearer pictures to use."