Where are they?

Cases similar to that of Cédrika Provencher, who disappeared, apparently abducted, more than a month ago, are rare. Kids running away from home is a whole different story: Since Jan. 1, 2,594 Montreal kids were reported missing as runaways or 'juvenile disappearances,' Montreal police service statistics show.

Day after day, more news arrives and more pictures of teenagers go up on posters, in newspapers and on web pages. At press time, it was 16-year-old Catherine Kennedy-Houle on the front page of the missing children section. Before her, it was Stéphanie Goudreault. Since June, Daminique-Woodly Pierre, Stéphanie Migneault-Desjardins, Claudia Pacheco Grenier, Jennie Joseph and André Lemieux have all gone missing without a trace.

"In 99% of these cases, it's usually a kid running away from home. Kidnappings are actually quite rare. More often than not, it's girls who are running away from home," said Montreal police service youth intervention and prevention squad Cmdr. Claude Charlebois.

Sadder still, is the ever-decreasing ages of the runaways. Police stats show that from Jan. 1 to June 30, 225 children under the age of 13 ran away from home.

"We find pretty much all of them eventually, especially if it's their first attempt at running away from home. What hurts is the repeat runaways. Those are the tough ones, because the kids who are running away for the second or third time know where to hide out, and they usually resort to criminal or illicit acts in order to get by," Charlebois added.

The Commander offered up the example of a 13-year-old girl that police found safe a short time ago. "On her first attempt at running away, we found her pretty quickly – she was at a friend's house. The second time, it took us a bit longer. After a few weeks of searching, we found her in a strip bar. Imagine! A 13-year-old in a place like that," he lamented.

Add to that the number of runaways who aren't originally from Montreal, and it complicates life for police.

"It's quite clear that kids from the regions that are thinking about running away are interested in coming to Montreal. They know they can 'survive' here. We find a lot of young runaways from the regions in Montreal. It's a reality we've become accustomed to and one which is typical with Montreal being the largest city in the province," Charlebois said.

There is a silver lining to the dark cloud in this situation: The number of runaways has been dwindling for that last few years, mirroring a pan-Quebec trend. "There are fewer children in Quebec than there used to be, so naturally, there are fewer runaways," Charlebois pointed out, however.

There are few such cases, about 15 or so in Quebec the last decade, and the majority were in Montreal. The most recent such case: five-year-old Karar Al-Meliki, who was taken this summer by his father. Police fear the two have since fled Canada.

"When we get a call for a parental abduction involving parents from another country, it's often too late. But there's no reason to think we won't ever find the child. We do! I personally was involved in a case where we tracked down Italian children who had been taken from their mother in Montreal, and the kids had been taken from Italy. So, yes, it's possible to find missing kids, even abroad," he said.

(Translated by Marc Lalonde)

(Photo: Courtesy)