Family members hold out hope for
missing loved ones
Monday, April 7, 2008
By Cari Scribner (Contact)
Gazette Reporter
ALBANY — More than one person in the crowd of about 150 held a box
of Kleenex on their lap, dabbing at their eyes while listening to presentations
in the Huxley Theater at the New York State Museum Sunday.
Outside in the
lobby, while small children held their parents’ hands and shrieked over the
museum displays of planets, fish and birds, card tables bearing T-shirts,
buttons, brochures and wedding photos stood as silent testament to New Yorkers
gone missing.“Our Mommy is Still Missing,” was screen- printed on one shirt,
accompanied by hand-scrawled letters from the children of Audrey May Herron of
Catskill, missing since Aug. 29, 2002. “Where is George LaForest?” was
emblazoned on dozens of posters at a nearby table, looking for any clues to the
disappearance of LaForest, who vanished April 21, 2006, in Indian Lake. Many of
the tables displayed Web site addresses for more information, most starting with
the letters www.find ... .
There was also a booth for parents to have child
identification cards made for young ones, who inked their thumbprints and smiled
for the camera without any notion of the serious nature of the photo
cards.
Kim Huskie of East Greenbush had cards made for her son, Jacob Evans,
5, and daughter Sierra Huskie, 15.
“I feel better having this information on
record,” Kim Huskie said. “It’s heartbreaking to think about. When I was little,
we went anywhere; we walked to school and to the park, we didn’t give it a
second thought. We live in different times today.”
The annual New York State
Missing Persons Day is held every year on April 6, coinciding with the birth
date of Suzanne Lyall, who disappeared 10 years ago while a student at the
University at Albany.
The daughter of Doug and Mary Lyall of Ballston Spa,
Suzanne’s parents established the Center for HOPE (Healing Our Painful Emotions)
eight years ago in their living room.
Since then, they’ve been the guiding
force behind generating more avenues for getting the names and faces of missing
people out in the public eye, pushing for tougher legislation, particularly
around school campuses, and bringing families and friends together for
comfort.
“There is tremendous strength and support we gain just from being in
the same shoes,” Doug Lyall said. “There’s a uniqueness of this ambiguous loss
we are faced with; we can describe it to others but not make them
understand.”
According to the New York Sheriff’s Association, there are 3,500
missing persons in New York state, with 1,400 over the age of 18. U.S. Rep.
Kristen Gillibrand told the audience she willl continue working to promote
safety measures for older students.
“We have many laws protecting children,
but on any given day there are thousands of adults missing, and many are
college-age women,” said Gillibrand. “People need to know it happens on college
campuses frequently. I thank the Lyalls from the bottom of my heart for working
to educate people. Most families never get beyond the kind of tragedy they’ve
seen.”
Riding for Audrey 2008 has already been scheduled! It will be held on July 19 at Brennan's School House Inn in Earlton.
If you know anything about what happened to Audrey, please call the New York State Police at (518)622-8600.
Audrey's website: http://riding4audrey.com/
Audrey's guestbook: http://pub26.bravenet.com/guestbook/2199754005/
Audrey's guestmap: http://pub26.bravenet.com/guestmap/view.php?usernum=2199754005
You can print a poster of Audrey at http://www.theyaremissed.org/ncma/gallery/ncmaprofile_all.php?A200300201S.
Photos of Audrey and her car from her poster.
**Some other missing New Yorkers covered on this blog but not mentioned in the article are Samantha Kibalo (Suffern), Arkadiy Tashman (Staten Island), Audrey Nerenberg (Brooklyn), Jeanne Marie Scrima (went missing in Pennsylvania), and Manreet Kaur (Astoria).**Update (7/23/08): Manreet Kaur has since been found alive.
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