Social Media A Game Changer In Missing Person Cases
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PLANO (CBSDFW.COM) - The brief window of time immediately after someone is reported missing is critical for investigators. Thus, many police departments are turning more to social media to help make the most of those first hours and minutes.
When a Plano boy went missing Monday night, Big Lake Park became the primary focus. Police were able to go heavy in the area where a pond presented the greatest threat, while a secondary effort by volunteers found the boy in a less obvious place.
A little shy, and maybe a little embarrassed, Jaylen, 7, didn't have a lot to say after giving his mom and a whole search party a scare.
"Just thinking about the bad things that could have happened and hoping that it didn't happen, but it's just running through my head, What if. That's my question over and over again, what if," Jaylen's mom, Jemetria Tasby asked.
Plano Police received the call around 8:30 that Jaylen had wandered off from his home near the intersection of Alma Drive and Spring Creek Parkway. Tasby told officers her son never crosses the busy intersection, so police looked south and focused on nearby Big Lake Park.
"It was very scary. I can't swim, and I know he can't swim, so that right there, I felt like he's gone," Tasby said.
After a couple hours of searching, police turned to social media to ask for the public's help. In just over an hour, a woman who read the Nextdoor post found Jaylen outside a shopping center on Alma Drive.
"It was like I just had him, just like holding a newborn child," Tasby said.
This is Plano's second success in less than a week. Thursday investigators had to wait for a doctor to help authorize a silver alert for a missing elderly man, but while they waited, someone recognized the man from a Facebook post and led police to him. Now as social media becomes a game changer for officers, they're not the only ones learning a valuable lesson.
Asked what he learned from all this, Jaylen said softly, "That I should never do it again."
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