Molly Dattilo is a college track star and a straight-A student. She's got blonde hair, and at five foot nothing and one hundred pounds even, she's tiny but charming. Molly is an accomplished vocalist and guitarist with aspirations of making her musical debut on "American Idol," and she is a friend of mine from the days of high school cross country meets.
Molly Dattilo disappeared on July 6 without a trace and hasn't been seen since. She was attending summer classes at IUPUI in Indianapolis and went to apply for a summer job at Wendy's. Nobody ever saw her again. Her car, cell phone, ID, wallet and bank card were found in the parking lot of her apartment. She disappeared with only the clothes on her back and her keys. Police have no leads. Her family says they suffer from nightmares.
A few local news channels and a few Indiana newspapers have covered the story of Molly's disappearance, and Molly's parents have helped put up a total of 43 billboards across the state asking drivers if they've seen her. However, there has not been much mention about the story from networks or 24-hour news channels.
The local television mentions and billboards are wonderful, but the state should take more responsibility for making information about missing persons more public. More than 3500 missing persons and runaway cases are reported in Marion County alone each year, Capt. Chris Heffner of the Marion County Sheriff's Department told the Indianapolis Star. Molly's cousin, Amy Dattilo, told the Indianapolis Star she was concerned that Indiana, unlike many states, does not have a state coordinator for missing adults.
This may be the first time you're hearing about Molly, but I bet you've heard of Elizabeth Smart and Lacy Peterson. While Molly's name has been mentioned several times in passing on Fox News, her story has not gotten the national coverage that other missing persons cases receive. Molly's sister, Kendra, told Child Seek, a non-profit organization dedicated to keeping missing person cases in the public eye, that she felt families with the most money and influence get the most support and attention from the media. She said the Dattilo family asked a prominent individual from a well-known missing persons case for help with connections to media coverage for Molly's case, and he told her that he didn't feel Molly met the "status criteria" to warrant his assistance with the media.
According to the FBI, there are 47,842 active missing adult cases in the United States as of July 30, 2004. Indiana has emergency systems in place, like AMBER Alert, to spread the word on television and radio stations about missing children as soon as cases are reported. Often, missing adult cases take a backseat to missing child cases in media coverage, and the general public might say rightfully so. Molly Dattilo may be 23, but she is still someone's child. She is someone's sister, someone's girlfriend, and she had a big life in front of her. Thousands of missing persons are reported each year, but most of them just seem like anonymous faces and names until the face that smiles up at you from a missing persons ad is the same face smiling up at you from the pages of your high school scrapbook.
For more information about fund-raising efforts and a picture and description of Molly, visit http://www.dattilofamily.org. If you have any information at all concerning Molly or her disappearance, please contact your local law enforcement agency or Captain Chris Heffner with the Marion County Sheriff's Dept. at 317-231-8154 or e-mail lookformolly@adelphia.net.
Write to Alyssa at akmiller@bsu.edu
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