Elgin police joins suburban departments taking part in child abduction exercise
Residents of two Frankfort subdivisions played a role Thursday in an exercise meant to train law enforcement working on child abduction cases.
The culmination of a weeklong course conducted by the FBI’s Child Abduction Rapid Deployment team, the scenario had officers fanning out among the Lakeview Estates South and Prestwick subdivisions, with police from 60 agencies involved.
Officers from Elgin and several south and southwest suburban police departments took part, with Orland Park police Chief Tim McCarthy saying the training for six officers from his department will be valuable in future missing-child cases.
“There’s nothing more gut-wrenching,” he said of a missing-child case at a news conference at the end of the training session.
Todd Carroll, deputy special agent in charge of the FBI’s Chicago office, said “time is a critical factor” in a missing-child investigation and that “not a moment can be lost.”
The program was established by the FBI in 2005 to assist local law enforcement investigating such cases and has been deployed 151 times since. The efforts have led to the recovery of 71 children, according to Martha Parker, child abduction program coordinator.
She said that, each year, more than 100 children are abducted in the U.S. by a stranger or acquaintance and that because of the relative rarity of such abductions, local departments might not be fully equipped, from a training standpoint, to resolve them.
For Thursday’s training, an exercise command post had been set up inside Chelsea Elementary School, at Sauk Trail and 80th Avenue, and FBI agents sat at tables in the school’s cafeteria and scanned computer screens.
In the abduction scenario, a 10-year-old girl — portrayed by the daughter of a team member — went missing on her way to see her tutor, according to Michael Barker, a local FBI agent who helped design the scenario.
Using social media, surveillance video and canvassing of neighborhoods, investigators determined the girl had stopped at a neighborhood park where a man, pretending that he was looking for his lost dog, solicited her help and abducted her, Barker said.
The hunt culminated in the leafy Prestwick subdivision, north of Sauk Trail and just west of Harlem Avenue, with police apprehending and cuffing a burly, bearded man wearing a black T-shirt who was led to a waiting car. The abductor was portrayed by a police officer.
Police and FBI agents searched the home and in a few minutes escorted out the girl wearing a red softball T-shirt.
Residents of the two subdivisions acted out roles and read from scripts as officers interviewed them and searched their homes looking for the missing girl, Barker said.
Police had notified residents in advance of the training exercise, and those who played roles in the abduction scenario “did a great job,” Barker said.
“When it comes to kids, people are willing to cooperate and are eager to do so,” he said.
Parker praised the assistance that law enforcement got from residents and noted that area businesses provided snacks for police involved in the scenario.
“An entire community came together to assist us with this exercise,” she said.
McCarthy said that in the 24 years he’s been in Orland Park, the department has had three missing-child cases, and in all three the child was either in the home or somewhere on the property. Even though police searched the homes in each case, kids “can really squirrel themselves away,” the chief said, noting that one child was later found tucked inside a tiny space inside a playhouse in the yard.
McCarthy said that with the training his officers received, “we will be far better prepared, far better organized” the next time a child goes missing.
In addition to police from many south suburban departments, officers from Yorkville, Kendall County, Naperville, Oak Park and Oswego were scheduled to participate.