The Tribune

By LEANDRA ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

lrolle@tribunemedia.net

A 12-year-old boy who was reported missing on the weekend has been found and is safe with his family, a close relative told The Tribune yesterday.

Kooban Barr was last seen leaving his residence on Farrington Road on Saturday, according to police reports. However, hours after he was reported missing, relatives said the 12-year-old was found.

Describing the experience as a total nightmare, Clarissa Sturrup, the boy’s mother, said she was relieved when a friend of hers called and said her son had been found and that he was safe.

“We found him at Carmichael Road Police Station last night,” she told The Tribune yesterday, adding the child was missing for about seven to eight hours.

Asked yesterday about the family’s reaction to the news, Ms Sturrup replied: “We were very relieved. It was very frightening and very stressful as a mother and I’m his mother so I was very relieved.”

The mother said the ordeal has shown her the significance of the MARCO Alert system being fully implemented.

She said: “. . .When a child goes missing I don’t think 48 hours is a good time to wait if someone is missing. In the instance that they’re missing, the first thing is an alert should be going out to say that the child is missing because you don’t know what’s going on.”

After the murder of 11-year-old Marco Archer in 2011, a law was enacted allowing authorities to send notifications alerting the public to missing children, dubbed the Mandatory Action Rescuing Children Operation (MARCO) Alert.

While the system was rolled out by the Christie administration, it is unclear if it was ever used and it was set for an overhaul by the Minnis administration.

Last year, Minister of National Security Marvin Dames said the government had committed $3.05 million over three years for the MARCO Alert. A contract was signed between the government and Multimedia Technologies for the MARCO’s Alert system in late August in 2019.

Speaking in the House of Assembly last week, Mr Dames noted that the MARCO’s alert system was still in “its testing phase and will soon be available nationally.”

He said: “All of the hard work for MARCO’s Alert has been installed and both telecommunications providers integrated. The system is in its testing phase and will soon be available nationally.

“Mr Speaker, members of the public have begun to see infrastructural works on the digital boards in four locations, including the RM Bailey Park, Arawak Cay, Baillou Hill Road South, and JFK west.

“The programme should be in operation August 2020, not too long. Mr Speaker, my ministry will invest some $350,000 in the new fiscal period for billboards in New Providence. The billboards will be used to broadcast important messages whenever an alert on a missing child is issued.

“… It is our intent to utilise the platform sometime during this fiscal period to introduce a pilot around the sexual offenders registry, which was laid before this parliament by this government last year.”