1,790 kids in Ga. state care have been reported missing, stats show
ATLANTA, Ga. (WRDW/WAGT) - U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff says 1,790 children in the care of the Georgia Department of Family and Child Services were reported missing between 2018 and 2022.
He released the information during a Friday news conference at Covenant House, citing an analysis conducted by the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
He got the data as part of an ongoing bipartisan investigation into the abuse and neglect of children in foster care. The investigation is being conducted by the Senate Human Rights Subcommittee chaired by Ossoff.
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According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, children who go missing from care are left more vulnerable to human trafficking, sexual exploitation, and other threats to their health and safety.
“These numbers are deeply troubling because these are more than numbers. These are children,” said Ossoff, D-Ga. “And according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services — and I think the leadership here at Covenant House has a lot of experience with issues like this — children who go missing from care are left more vulnerable to human trafficking, to sexual exploitation and to other threats to their health and safety.”
This is about human beings, Ossoff said.
“This is about vulnerable children who deserve protection from abuse, who deserve sanctuary from neglect,” he said. “And that is why I will continue relentlessly to investigate failures to protect the most vulnerable children in our state.”
Of the 1,790 children in the care of Georgia DFCS who were reported missing, the center’s review found some children were repeatedly reported missing from DFCS care — as the center’s study found nearly 2,500 episodes of children in the care of Georgia DFCS being reported missing in the five-year span.
The Federal Preventing Sex Trafficking and Strengthening Families Act, signed into law in 2014, requires State agencies to report a missing child to both law enforcement and NCMEC within 24 hours of receiving information about a missing child under their care.
NCMEC is a nonprofit organization designated by Congress to serve as the national clearinghouse on issues relating to missing and exploited children.
On Wednesday, Human Rights Subcommittee Chairman Ossoff and Ranking Member Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., convened a hearing in Washington, D.C., to receive testimony from former foster kids, parents, and experts as part of the Subcommittee’s ongoing bipartisan investigation into the treatment of foster children in the United States.
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