Three criteria must be met before the State Police will activate the plan:
A child, 17 years of age or younger, has been abducted;
The child is in danger of serious bodily harm, injury or death; and
There is enough descriptive information to believe that an AMBER Alert may help locate the child.

Since 2002 the Massachusetts Child AMBER Alert has been activated 15 times and successfully recovered and reunited 23 children with their families.

This is entirely anecdotal for me, but I also work at the radio station that originates Amber Alerts in Massachusetts. I think a lot of them do involve custody dispute, but I've never heard one here and gone "this is bullshit".

http://www.mass.gov/eopss/crime-prev-pe ... teria.html



From what I've heard they seem to take the second and third one pretty seriously. When I heard them issued and it involves a relative there tends to be a history of violence with the adult involved, and they don't issue them unless they have a decent amount of information to give out that will help people locate/ID the person/vehicle.

All in all, I think these are a great idea, at least how I've seen them used.

Also, originating an Amber Alert from a tech standpoint is a huge pain in the ass.

So is this 'amber alert' thing different to just reporting your child missing? Because in those scenarios, I probably wouldn't hesitate to do that.

Yes, it's more than that. An Amber Alert is initiated by authorities after the child has been reported meeting and (at least in my state) certain criteria have been met (see my previous post).

What happens next is a takeover of broadcast media via our Emergency Alert System (and more recently, text messages are sent to people within the target area).

In Massachusetts, the way the EAS take over works is the message is sent from the State Police to the initiating radio station. It contains audio of a State Trooper reading the alert, in which he gives all the information they have on the child's description, who they believe the child is with, the vehicle they are thought to be in, where they were last seen, and where they believe they may be heading. For the next 8 hours, every half an hour we play that alert on the air, including alert tones all via a special piece of equipment specifically for the Emergency Alert System. Those tones are picked up by the equipment in other radio stations, and their broadcast is taken over. That way, no matter who you are listening to, you're getting the message about the missing child and can keep your eyes open for them. At the same time, this is happening on broadcast TV and cable services. On top of all this, there's the text messages that are sent (which I have yet to see happen in Massachusetts) and the alert is displayed on electronic road signs throughout the area.

It's really an amazing system when you stop and think about it. On top of all that, since we're a news station as well as the initiating radio station for the Amber Alert, it's our company policy that while an Amber Alert is active, not only do we play the official message, but the missing child becomes our lead news story at least until the alert is inactive.

Well, 1) it does sound like an amazing system which 2) could be excessive in some cases, and 3) could be hilarious for any parent of a teenager who was just being an idiot and running away repeatedly.

From what I've seen in Massachusetts it doesn't seem to be used in cases like you say, where it's just some kid running. At least here, they seem to be pretty good with the "child is in danger of serious bodily harm, injury, or death" and have descriptive information to tell the public. Those criteria won't be met if it's just some pot smoking teenager running away.

the last one I got was about a girl who was abducted after her mom and brother were killed (she was later found), so its not all just custody battles.

One often wonders if an Amber Alert could have saved Adena Watson.

I think Skitch is just dead inside.

They also pump Amber alerts on the digital road signs out here. I feel as though ive seen a couple of them this past summer.

I think the concept of Amber Alerts is great. The problem is, around here, they have been abused to the point of being meaningless.

I think the concept of Amber Alerts is great. The problem is, around here, they have been abused to the point of being meaningless.