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It’s a nightmare every parent has…their child has vanished and is more than likely in danger.

That nightmare became reality recently for two North Carolina families. In separate cases, two 15-year-old girls – one from Harnett County and the other from Chatham County – disappeared from their respective homes.

The good news is that both were found physically unharmed. But the bad news remains….there are predators lurking in the shadows of the Internet, working to gain the trust of innocent children for a future abduction and possibly into the hands of a human trafficker.

Thusly, the nightmare remains all too vivid in the minds of parents.

On Tuesday of last week, a 15-year-old female from Spring Lake in Harnett County was reported missing. Fortunately she was located two days later at a residence in Kitty Hawk.

The investigation into her disappearance led to the arrests of Elihue Martin Mahler, age 31 of Virginia Beach, and Austyn Lee Cole, age 23 of Kitty Hawk. Both face charges of felony human trafficking of a child victim, felony kidnapping, felony conspiracy to kidnap, and felony conspiracy, human trafficking. They were jailed, each under a $5 million bond.

But how did two men, from different states, jointly interact with a teen female who lived 250 miles from the Outer Banks?

The FBI believes one of the two suspects met the teen online.

“No minor goes willingly,” said Philip VanWyngarden, FBI Special Agent, in a press conference after the girl was found. “Anytime you get a minor engaging with a predator online and they do something in the real world, or for that matter they do something online, they are minors – they’re victims … they’re being manipulated.”

He added that once the online process transitions to a real world incident, it’s at that moment where such cases can and have resulted in tragic consequences.

According to The International Labour Organization, there are approximately 40.3 million victims of human trafficking globally. Of these millions of victims, 25 percent are children, 75 percent are female, and 81 percent are trapped in some form of forced labor, to include the worst of all: sex trafficking.

Thankfully, due to the diligence of the various law enforcement agencies participating in the cases of the two North Carolina teens, that nightmare did not materialize.

At the same press conference, Harnett County Sheriff Wayne Coats noted that the court authorized use of cell phone records and social media accounts helped greatly in the investigation in locating the girl and the two suspects.

The first recent abduction was reported Feb. 21 to the Siler City Police. Two suspects were quickly identified and arrested: Ronny Suarez who was found with the teen in Asheboro on Feb. 27, and Saul Ramirez Guvara, who was arrested at a motel in Kinston.

Both were jailed on charges, including first-degree kidnapping, human trafficking of a child, and several other charges.

While the two cases are believed to be unrelated, investigative work remains, to the point of was one or both of these cases part of a larger scale human trafficking ring as well as discovering how the suspects in both cases, living in different areas, knew and interacted with each other.

Meanwhile, the message from the FBI to parents is it is important for mom and dad to be engaged with their children in how they are interacting with others on the Internet. Parents need to have conversations with their children about who they are talking to online. Parents need to have access to the online accounts of their children and routinely check their devices to see who and when they engaging in such conversations.

“Children now are technically savvy within the online space, but lack real world experience in decision making skills concerning the consequences of their online actions,” VanWyngarden stressed at the press conference. “Predators are out there, working to victimized these children. It isn’t about the location of the victims, urban or rural, of if they are rich or poor, it’s about predators seeking out children online and working to victimize them.”

The Department of Homeland Security offered more tips about how parents/guardians can protect children and young teens from online predators.

For younger children, teach them not to click on pop-ups.

Explain that they should never share passwords, addresses or personal information with people they don’t know online.

Create a series of steps they should follow if they see inappropriate content, such as looking away and telling a parent or trusted adult.

Warn them not to trust people they meet online, and tell them they should tell a trusted adult if someone makes them feel nervous, scared or uncomfortable.

Teach online etiquette and how to be respectful of others, and let them know they should tell someone if they feel disrespected.

Help them identify a trusted adult or guardian they can go to for help.

For tweens and teens, talk about how they should never post personal information or inappropriate content. Discuss sexting and the permanency of online data.

Teach them how to avoid online predators by setting up privacy controls on their devices, like restricting apps’ location access.

Explain the warning signs that characterize online predators. Tell them that safe adults won’t ask them to keep secrets or disrespect their boundaries. Help them identify a trusted adult or guardian they can go to for help.

Discuss steps they can take if a friend confides in them about inappropriate online interactions, such as telling a trusted adult or pointing them to Know2Protect resources.

Explain to them that minors shouldn’t disseminate sexual abuse material because it’s illegal. Explain that even if they’ve already shared sexual abuse material or been involved in inappropriate online interactions, it’s not too late to tell an adult and get help.

Top 10 Tips2Protect are as follows:

Start an open, two-way conversation with your child.

Password-protect or control access to your child’s app store and gaming downloads.

Set time and area limits for use of devices and set device check-in times.

Set all apps, games and devices to private.

Turn off location data services on social media and nonessential apps.

Talk about data permanency. Online data can last a lifetime.

Create a contract with your child regarding online behavior.

Know your child’s friend lists. Remove strangers.

Warn your child that they should never leave a game to chat with someone they don’t know on a different platform.

Do not delete messages, images or videos from predators and do not forward any sexually explicit images or videos. Save usernames, screenshots and images or videos as evidence for law enforcement to collect directly from the device.

Hopefully these tips will save parents from the nightmare of having a child abducted, sexually abused, or losing their life.

 

Cal Bryant is the Editor of Roanoke-Chowan Publications. Contact him at cal.bryant@r-cnews.com or 252-332-7207.