jab
Veteran Member
I disagree that police are useless and only look for missing people from wealthy families. It IS true that fairly often, when the missing person is a teenager or very young adult, there is a greater presumption that the missing person is a runaway (as if that meant they were less likely to be in danger). Missing children and vulnerable adults garner a lot of local attention. So do missing boaters, hunters and fishermen and snow mobilers. Less often missing hikers in my corner of the state but more so in larger wilderness areas. Most such cases only get local or sometimes regional attention
Note: I live in a small city (25K) surrounded by smaller towns but mostly farmland, some forested area, prairies, lakes and rivers. The nearest large metropolitan area is more than 100 miles away.
Yes, what the police suspect to be the situation plays a big role in the sort of search that's mounted.
The police generally only put in much effort when it's someone they suspect is in danger and not due to their own criminal activities. (Which means missing prostitutes don't get looked for--but to a considerable degree this is because it's basically futile. If it was a serial killer in the car rather than a normal john the chance of catching him is basically zero other than through his screwing up. Throwing a lot of effort into a hopeless case isn't a good use of resources.)
um, re serial killers of prostitutes: examine the case of Robert Pickton--On the Farm is a pretty good book