Missing S.F. autistic girl found dead - SFGate
FRIDAY, March 23 (HealthDay News) -- The Oertel family lives in a red-brick, two-story house tucked in a tree-lined, suburban Maryland cul-de-sac. There's no fence, just a small alarm company sign on the lawn that gives no clue to the system's real purpose.
The array of bolts high on the front door, the upgraded locks on the patio and garage doors and the "burglar" alarm are meant less to keep out intruders than to prevent 15-year-old Luke Oertel from silently leaving.
Luke has a moderate form of autism, a developmental disorder that affects a child's social interactions, language and behavior. He is among those with autism who wander without a typical child's sense of fear or danger.
In June, Luke outsmarted a system of combination locks and wandered five miles away, through the early-morning rush hour, taking a pedestrian underpass beneath a heavily traveled road off the Capital Beltway.
Last year, "autism wandering" became an official diagnosis in the United States with its own medical code. Some of those afflicted enter strangers' houses. Others end up in traffic or on train tracks. Many find their way to nearby pools or ponds.
Is the Philadelphia Cell Phone Jammer a Hero or Pest?
“While some people who use jammers may think they are only silencing loud conversations or disabling unwanted GPS tracking, they could also be preventing a scared teenager from calling 911, an elderly person from placing an urgent call to a doctor, or a rescue team from homing in on the location of a severely injured person,” Ellison said. “The price for one person’s moment of peace or privacy, could very well be the safety and well-being of others.”
First Rescue in Boston Using SafetyNet System
BOSTON, Sept. 9, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Yesterday morning, a 15-year-old resident of East Boston – who has autism and is enrolled in the SafetyNet Service – wandered away from his school to one of his favorite spots – the subway system – and was rescued within approximately 20 minutes by MBTA Transit Police using the SafetyNet by LoJack System. This is the first rescue in Boston since the service was made available in January 2011.
The Details of the Rescue:
When school officials noticed the boy was missing, they immediately called 911. Boston Police Department dispatch notified its ground units, as well as the MBTA Transit Police Department. Police were alerted that the boy's last known location was North Station and arrived with their SafetyNet tracking equipment. Approximately 20 minutes after arriving at North Station, officers with the MBTA Transit Police began picking up a signal emitting from the missing boy's SafetyNet Bracelet. The signal was coming from Downtown Crossing and was strongest underground. Officers went underground into the subway, boarded a train and were able to locate the boy, who was heading southbound. Using techniques learned in the SafetyNet training sessions, the officers were able to effectively communicate with and approach the boy and ultimately safely remove him from the train. He was rescued unharmed and later brought back to his parent.
"We are proud of our transit police officers' quick response to this emergency situation," said Transit Police Deputy Chief Joseph O'Connor. "With the use of SafetyNet Search and Rescue Receivers, officers were able to reunite the lost child with his family within minutes."
This is the first rescue of a client enrolled in the SafetyNet by LoJack service in the city of Boston.
The SafetyNet service is comprised of a SafetyNet Bracelet worn by a client that emits Radio Frequency signals, which can be tracked by local public safety officials via their SafetyNet Search and Rescue Receivers.
The SafetyNet service is currently available to residents in Boston, as well as many surrounding towns and counties. In an effort to provide valuable protection to individuals at risk of wandering, LoJack SafetyNet™, Inc. is currently providing 1,500 free SafetyNet devices -- along with six months of service -- now through September 30, 2011 to any interested caregivers living in SafetyNet's coverage areas. For more information on SafetyNet by LoJack and the giveaway, please contact (877) 4-FINDTHEM (877-434-6384) or visit www.safetynetbylojack.com.
BOGOTA – The body of a 3-year-old autistic boy who had been reported missing was found on the weekend in a creek in the town of Mosquera, near Bogota, authorities reported Sunday.
The police commander of central Cundinamarca province, Col. Fabio Alejandro Castañeda, told Efe that the body of Deivi Mateo Algarra was found on Saturday putting an end to 10 days of search efforts.
When the family of the boy reported his disappearance, the initial hypothesis was that he had been kidnapped, but that was soon ruled out and a search operation was launched with more than 100 participants that eventually turned up the body of the child in a stream that flows into the Bogota River, about 500 meters (yards) from his home.
The police commander said that “when the mother of the boy was distracted he began to walk and, since he had problems with autism, he didn’t let anyone touch him, he spoke with nobody, and so he decided to walk until night came and he accidentally fell into the river and drowned.”
http://www.laht.com/article.asp?ArticleId=422455&CategoryId=12393
GLEICHEN – RCMP are searching for a 21-year-old autistic woman from the Siksika First Nation.
Desiree Oldwoman was last seen on Saturday night around 8:30p.m. Police believe she may have wandered away from her home.
Desiree is around 5’4” tall and weighs 165 lbs. She has short brown hair and brown eyes. She was wearing a brown sweater and black pants with a red stripe. She does not speak but can write her name.
Investigators are unsure of where she may have wandered off to but she may have been spotted walking along Highway #901.
GREAT BEND, Kansas — Barton County Sheriff's officials are on the lookout tonight for 11-year-old Ryan Durland.
Durland disappeared after 4 p.m. in Twin Lakes area in Great Bend.
Barton County dispatch tells KSN the boy is autistic.
He is 4 feet 8 inches tall and weighs about 90 pounds. He was last seen wearing an orange and white shirt, blue jean shorts, and yellow cropped shoes.
If you have seen him, you are asked to call Barton County authorities immediately.
"We constantly have our eye on the door and on Michael, and it's a hard way to live," said Melanie Browne of Katy, Texas. "I think that's the hardest part of raising him, is just the wandering issue."
Autism groups are calling for greater awareness and study of what they call "wandering" or "elopement" behavior, referring to this habit of fleeing a place at any moment. Neither of those words accurately describes the phenomenon, but there's no better shorthand at the moment, says Dr. Paul Law, director of the Kennedy Krieger Institute's Interactive Autism Network.
Wandering is probably the leading cause of death among children with autism, Law said. Only limited data are available, but drowning seems most common among these fatalities.
LAVAL, Quebec, April 5 (UPI) -- A missing autistic toddler likely drowned in a river near the Quebec home he was visiting, Canadian police said Tuesday.
The search for Adam Benhamma, 3, was concentrated on the Mille-Iles River in Laval, Quebec, the Canadian Broadcasting Corp. reported.
The boy, who disappeared Sunday while playing outside with his 7-year-old sister, cannot hear or speak. Their father had gone inside the house a short time before the sister rushed in to say she couldn't see her brother.
The ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee is currently considering a proposal to create a medical diagnostic code for wandering. Please sign this petition to show your support of this effort.
The National Autism Association has brought this issue to the urgent attention of our federal health agencies. We believe a diagnostic code for wandering will help protect at-risk individuals who have a documented history of wandering and will help to avert dangerous restraint and seclusion practices that are currently in use. Here's why:
- Physicians are largely unaware of this issue; therefore, cannot provide prevention materials or advice. A diagnostic code will increase awareness, advice and prevention-material distribution.
- A diagnostic code will allow for data collection on the incidence of wandering, thereby increasing opportunities for prevention, education for doctors, caregivers, school administrators and staff, first responders/search personnel.
- Many nonverbal ASD individuals are unable to respond to their name when called. We feel a diagnosis code will lead to increased awareness and the development of emergency search-and-rescue response protocols.
- We believe a medical code will enhance schools’ understanding of wandering so that children with a history of wandering will be better protected. Currently, wandering is not looked at as a medical condition, but one of choice or bad behavior. This has lead to a lack of school training, prevention and emergency response. In January alone, two children with autism went missing from their schools.
- Children and adults with ASD who suddenly flee, bolt or run because of a trigger are at greater risk of restraint or seclusion. We believe a medical code will help establish safe protocols that work to eliminate triggers, thereby eliminating the need for restraint.
- We’ve seen reports of parents locking/secluding children in their rooms to keep them from wandering outside. While this is anecdotal information, we believe parents, schools and other care providers need better solutions. A medical code has enormous potential to help provide safe alternatives.
- We believe every disabled individual with a history of wandering — who is at serious risk of injury, trauma or death — should have access to safety devices and prevention materials regardless of the caregiver's income. A medical code for wandering could potentially provide insurance coverage for those unable to afford critical protections for their children/adults.
If you would like to submit a personal or organizational letter to the ICD-9-CM Coordination and Maintenance Committee, please email Donna Pickett at DPickett@cdc.gov. The deadline for submission of public comments is April 1, 2011.
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