Cell phones in Bloomington were buzzing with details of an Amber Alert at 1:51 a.m. May 21. The alert was for 1-year-old Solomon Rhoades, who had last been seen at 8:30 p.m. May 20 in Hope, Indiana.
By 11 a.m. the following day, the alert had been cancelled. Columbus Police Department’s dispatch said the child had been found safely, but could give no further details of the ongoing investigation when the Indiana Daily Student called Sunday.
They also could not comment on whether any charges were being pressed at this time. According to the original press release issued by the Indiana State Police, Andrea Rhoades, a 43-year-old woman, was suspected of abducting the child.
Amber Alerts in Indiana are generally rare. There have been 48 since 2003, according to statistics from the Indiana State Police.
More common are requests for police departments to issue Amber Alerts. Since 2003, there have been 144 recorded alert requests in Indiana, but only one third of those have turned into actual activations of an alert.
Amber Alerts must follow a strict criteria laid out by the United States Department of Justice to ensure all state police departments are following the same guidelines.
Before issuing an alert, law enforcement must have reasonable belief an abduction occurred, the child must be 17 or younger, police must believe the child is in imminent danger, and there must be enough information for the Amber Alert to assist in the recovery of a child.
Cases are considered resolved if the child returns home to a parent or legal guardian, the child is within custody of law enforcement or the child has contacted the family but will not be returning home.
Parents can also state in writing that they no longer want law enforcement assistance in their child’s case. This would also be considered a resolved alert, according to information from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
In Indiana, the most Amber Alerts were issued in 2006 with eight. In 2009, there were no alerts.
According to Indiana State Police statistics, there have been no Amber Alerts issued in Bloomington. In 2016, an Amber Alert was requested from the Bloomington Police Department, but the subject was located before activation of the alert.
The Monroe County Sheriff Department has received two requests, one in 2004 and another in 2005, but both were listed as not meeting the criteria of an alert.
Nationwide data is only available up to 2015. During that year, 182 Amber Alerts were issued in 44 states. Texas issued the most alerts with 15 percent, or 27 alerts. California and Georgia came next, each with seven percent, or 13 alerts each.
Amber Alerts are named for Amber Hagerman, who was abducted in 1996 in Arlington, Texas. Four days after she went missing, her body was found in a creek about three miles from her home. Her murder remains unsolved.
Residents from Arlington and the larger Dallas-Fort Worth area were outraged by the case and called local radio stations and media outlets to voice their frustrations. One woman named Diana Simone, suggested an emergency alert system to let local residents know of abducted or missing children so people could assist with the search.
A program was established in the community and eventually taken to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, which created the system that is now used in all 50 states.
