Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
Keith McCord ReportingA child disappears in this country every 40 seconds. That's roughly 800-thousand every year!
Destiny Norton isn't the only child currently missing in Utah. There are nearly two dozen children from Utah listed as missing, and the stats show that cases like Destiny's-- where she simply vanished-- are not the most common reasons that kids disappear.
We searched the past decade on the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children's website and found 21 boys and girls from Utah missing.
Children disappear for a variety of reasons, but the most common are categorized as "runaways."
Of the 800,000 children reported missing in the U.S. each year, more than half--450-thousand-- run away from home. About 300-thousand children are abducted every year by family members. In a lot of cases, these are child custody disputes.
A third category-- and the one where the child is at the greatest risk of injury or death-- is refered to as "non-family, stereotypical abductions." Each year, more than 58-thousand kids fall into that group.
At this point, no one knows which category the Destiny Norton case falls in. For now, the investigation by law enforcement, and the search by hundreds of volunteers proceeds as if the five-year-old is still alive.
Dave Hatch, a former homicide detective, says that's the only way to proceed. Even though it's been five days, he says you never know!
Dave Hatch/ Nat'l Center for Missing & Exploited Children: "I wouldn't assume that you have a 12 hour window or 24 hours or 72 hours. That's the worst thing you can do. You just have to assume that she's alive until proven otherwise. You attack it in that manner. Do the search, and then second guess yourself and go back and do it again."
And he has advice for searchers-- don't overlook anything.
Dave Hatch/ Nat'l Center for Missing & Exploited Children: "You have to be very thorough, because you're looking for a 45 pound child. Children can get into anything. They can be in a 10 inch drain pipe. I know it. They could be uder a bundle of insulation, because I know it."
In the 21 Utah cases, seven were runaways; eight were taken by family members-- in a couple of those cases, the child was taken out of the country; two were kidnapped by strangers; and in three other cases, the kids just vanished.
