Washington, D.C. –Today, U.S. Senators Bob Casey (D-PA), Mike Enzi (R-WY), and Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) announced that their bipartisan legislation that would provide law enforcement with an additional tool to help find missing or exploited children has been signed into law by President Obama.
The Recovering Missing Children Act would allow taxpayer information from the Internal Revenue Service to be shared with state and local law enforcement agencies to assist in the investigation of missing or exploited children. Transfer of taxpayer information would occur only if strict standards for confidentiality and protection of the information from unauthorized use were observed by the state and local agencies.
“If the provisions in this bill can bring one child back to their rightful families safe and sound, it is worth it,” Casey said. “This legislation will assist those who have been searching and spending sleepless nights worried about their missing children, and do it in a way that doesn’t undermine Americans’ privacy.”
“Law enforcement is working every day to find missing children who have been taken from their homes, but unfortunately the most up-to-date information isn’t always available to help,” Enzi said. “With the signing of this bill into law we are creating a common-sense fix to help provide law enforcement with the tools needed to recover these missing children while at the same time protecting taxpayer privacy.”
“As a former prosecutor, I know that returning missing children to their families is one of the most important tasks law enforcement officers have. They need every tool available to track these children down and bring criminals to justice,” Klobuchar said. “Today, our bipartisan bill was signed into law by the President. It will help provide police and prosecutors access to critical information that could help bring missing children home.”
The legislation also allows federal law enforcement to share information on a very limited basis with state and local law enforcement that are part of a task force directly involved in investigating and prosecuting such cases. Many investigations into missing and exploited children are conducted at the state and local level.
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