This is a
series of three events over the Bank Holiday weekend to raise awareness to
Missing Children’s Day.
Events will
be as follows:
Sunday 24th
May
1pm – March
for the Missing, Leicester City. Gather at Victoria Park Cenotaph walk through
to Town Hall Square in the centre. Please R.S.V.P to
events@foreversearching.com so we can keep police updated on numbers.
This will
include a 3 course dinner, live entertainment by Tara Londonwww.myspace.com/taralondon
and Cute Loony, who have supported
us in the past with charity events,
www.myspace.com/cuteloony.
We will also have key note speakers, including a representative from NPIA, and
we are hoping to secure speakers from Railway Children and one of the parental
abduction specific organisations.
11.00am –
Missing Children’s Day service at Leicester Cathedral. Please R.S.V.P to
events@foreversearching.com
so we can keep the Cathedral updated on numbers.
ConferenceinAmerica
Two of our FS team attended the National Missing Persons Roundtable conference
in Wilmington, North Carolina this month.
The
conference attendees were a mix of families of the missing, agencies, and Search
and Recover Specialists.
They met with Bob Smither from Laura Recovery Unit, and also with a couple of
PI’s and organisations and foundations set up by parents of other long term
missing kids.
They also met Robert Cooke who is the Father of Rachel Cooke missing from Texas.
There were some excellent ideas and initiatives raised at the conference, which
the Forever Searching team will be looking further into and we will update you
via this newsletter.
Official
Invitation
You are
cordially invited to Melissa Braden's 4th Birthday Party
6 April 2009 5:00 p.m.
A Birthday Party for Melissa Braden and all of the
20,000 other American Children who have been Illegally Kidnapped or held in
forced separation from their American Families
with the Full Support and Tacit Approval of the Government of Japan Please Join Us for Birthday Cake &
Candelight Vigil
2520 Massachusetts Ave NW Washington, DC 20008
Melissa Braden - Born 6
April 2005 Los Angeles California
Missing Since 16 March 2006
Japanese Embassy
to the United States of America 2520
Massachusetts Ave NW Washington, DC 20008 RSVP
Click Here View Larger Map
The 25th May is International
Missing Children’s Day (IMCD). The main purpose of the International Missing
Children’s Day is to encourage everyone to remember all the children missing in
the UK, Europe and around the world and to send a message of hope and solidarity
at international level to parents who do not know where their children
are or what has become of them.
The NPIA are co-ordinating with the Global Missing Children’s Network to
recognise IMCD and will be holding an event on the South Bank in London to help
to raise awareness of the day.
Please encourage everyone you know to wear a ‘forget-me-not’ badge or wrist band
on the day and support a missing person’s charity in the UK;
the contribution is voluntary.
Our church (C of E) began meeting to pray for us and Andrew
the Wednesday after he disappeared. They have continued to meet every week
since. They suggested we fast and pray for Andrew on the day that marked 18
months since he vanished. We decided to open the church in the early evening
and invite all comers to drop in and pray with us. We produced several
displays:
·Forever
Searching: bus shelter poster, info. About the charity, 2 videos scrolling.
·Help Find My
Child: info. & leaflets, article about a family they have helped.
·Missing People:
info. & video about the charity’s work, leaflets.
·BBC Switch video
for teens with Missing People leaflets.
·Prodigal son
video based on Luke 15.
·Powerpoint
statistics, information & prayer points scrolling on main screen.
·Tie a yellow
lapel ribbon to pin on as a sign of searching for the lost: video with this.
·Make an origami
crane as a sign of hope.
·Draw round your
hand, write the name of someone lost and stick it up thinking about
any helping hand you can offer as an individual in that situation.
·
Write a prayer for missing children & pin it to a board.
·Write an apology
for when we have not cared & not done all we can and throw it in a bin.
·A press article
timeline about Andrew.
·Answers to
prayer: kids found that we prayed for in September 2008 service (11 of 28).
·Light a candle
to pray for Andrew.
The meeting began with a prayer following which people were
invited to circulate and participate in whatever way they felt comfortable. A
sheet with prayers to use was prepared to help people pray.
The building was decorated with yellow ribbons and flowers
and over 50 people came, including the deputy chair of Doncaster Council, who
was particularly struck by the scale of this problem in our society.
Following the meeting I produced a
document of prayers for missing children using the prayers we prepared and that
people wrote on the night. If anyone would like a copy of this, or of the
powerpoint presentation, please email
enquiries@foreversearching.com
and I will happily send them to you.
29thMarch2009 -
3 YearRemembrance
Disappearance of
JESSICA EDITH LOUISE FOSTER
Jessica Foster, a bright, young and beautiful
girl, with her whole life in front of her, disappeared off the face of the earth
on this day in 2006.
Jessie left her home in Kamloops, Canada in April
2005 to go with a friend on a trip to the United States . She returned home in
May 2005, and quickly told her family that she was going back to the States, but
would be back in a few days.
A few days after leaving, Jessie called her
mother Glendene to let her know that she had changed her plans, and was now
going to Las Vegas to visit a friend. Jessie arrived in Las Vegas on May 13,
2005 and called her mother to say that as her 21st birthday was in 2
weeks, she was going to stay there to celebrate.
“One thing
that haunts me to this day is that I said to Jessie that I wanted a contact
number of someone in Las Vegas because if something happened to her or if she
went missing, I needed to have someone to call'. (Glendene)
Jessie went missing 10 months later, on the 29th
March 2006, under very mysterious circumstances. She simply vanished off the
face of the earth the day after talking to her older sister Crystal.
Jessie has not been been heard from again, her phone,
credit cards, bank accounts or passport have not been touched. Jessie who
maintained constant contact with her family & friends in Canada throughout her
10 month stay in the USA, simply just vanished.
It is thought that Jessie could be possibly a
human trafficking victim or a victim of a truck driver/serial killer in Las
Vegas, but there is no proof of anything. All that we do know is that Jessica
Foster is out there some where and some one knows where and her family want
her back.
On the 3 year anniversary of her disappearance, let us
all send positive thoughts to the family of Jessica Foster, a family who have
worked tirelessly to bring Jessie home, let us tell family and friends
about this young girl who simply just vanished. Word of mouth is one of our
strongest tools. Distribute a flyer of Jessica to all your e-mail contacts.
If you have any information about Jessica Foster
please contact one of the following
Detective Dave Molnar - North Las Vegas Police Department - Phone: (702)
633-1779
Detective Mike Hope/Crimestoppers - City: Las Vegas, Nevada - Phone: (702)
229-3445
Las Vegas Crimestoppers - Phone: (702) 385-5555
The
British10kRun –
London
We still have places left to complete our team, please let us
know if you would be interested in running (brisk walk) and raising sponsorship
for us. The events takes place on Sunday 12th July 2009. If you
would like to attend but in the capacity of a supporter, please let us know as
well as we would be keen to have some non-competitor support to carry the
placards of missing children, banners and posters. Write to us at:events@foreversearching.com
RegisteredSexOffenderChargedwithManslaughter
Forever Searching has
assisted the family of Donna Jou in raising awareness to her case,
almost from the beginning. Donna Jou and her family hold a very
special place in the hearts of the founders and members of the Forever
Searching team.
Donna Jou was 19 years old, a pre-med student with her whole life in
front of her, when she went missing from her LA home on the 23rd June
2007.
Donna was last seen by her family at around 5.30 in the afternoon,
when she climbed onto the back of the motorcycle being driven by
Steven Burgess.
Donna was known to be a girl with a huge heart, just wanting to
trust and help others, had posted her services as a Mathematics tutor
on the web-site, Craigslist.com, this is where it is believed she came
into contact with Steven Burgess and they agreed to meet. Steven
Burgess picked Donna up from her home in Rancho Santa Margarita, where
she lived with her mother.
That was the last her family saw of her.
Steven Burgess, whilst in jail on other charges, refused to speak
about his contact with Donna, he maintained his silence holding out
for a deal. No deal materialised, so he has never spoken about
what happened to Donna Jou that night. Until now.
Now after almost 2 years, on Tuesday 17th March 2009, Steven Burgess
has been officially charged with involuntary manslaughter.
It is believed that Donna Jou died that night, as a result of a drug
overdose. A few days later Burgess rented himself a small boat and
took the body of Donna Jou in his Ford Ranger to this boat. He steered
the boat offshore, weighted the body down and dumped it overboard
somewhere off the coast.
Did Donna take drugs of her own accord, very unlikely, or was she
forced? we may never know. If anything, Donna's case reminds us of the
dangers of the internet, and if anything is to be learnt from this
very sad case, is that every one of us should think twice, before
meeting up with any one we meet on the internet.
Read about Donna's case on her dedicated web-site:
http://www.donnajou.com/index.html
Our thoughts and prayers and our continued support go out to the Jou
family at this very difficult time.
The angels are always
near to those who are grieving,
to whisper to them that their loved ones are safe in the hand of
God.
