Amanda Gifford
Critique Two: An empirical examination of AMBER Alert ‘successes’
Professor Levy
June 9th, 2015
Amanda Gifford
6/9/15
Critique: An empirical examination of AMBER Alert ‘successes’
MAIN POINT
The author is trying to accomplish to how successful the AMBER alert system is in contributing to the swift recovery of abducted children. The author discusses obstacles to the AMBER alert effectiveness such as the need for a quick response time and the need to make sure the police have attained the crucial information they need for the case. The author attained her research by taking a sample of 243 AMBER alert success stories from the NCMEC along with 93 additional cases. The author then compared the alert effect, relationship …show more content…
The kidnapping ultimately led the creation of the AMBER alert system. The letters AMBER stand for America’s Missing Broadcast Emergency Response. “An AMBER alert is broadcasted when a child is reported missing under circumstances authorities deem dangerous” (Griffin, 2010). An alert is sent to television and radio companies along with cellular telephone service providers. The alerts include information about the victim such as their eye color, weight, height, age, and race. Studies on the effectiveness of the AMBER alert system have shown that in almost one-third of cases the system is proven to be more effective when the cases are less sinister such as custody cases when the child is abducted by a parent. Eighty percent of most success stories in the article involve abductions by a family member or someone known by the victim. Only forty-one percent of the abductions were by strangers and out of the forty-one percent, nineteen were vehicle thefts where the child was not intentionally abducted (Griffin, …show more content…
The AMBER alert system may not save hundreds of lives each year but over a period of time it saves hundreds of lives. Another issue the author has with the AMBER alert system is the alert appeals backfiring against law enforcement. Sometimes calls are a hoax. If it is not a hoax then the police will look incompetent if they do not do anything. If it is a hoax then the police look silly. The response time for a successful AMBER alert is finding the victim within three hours. Even though time is exceeded, it’s impossible to know what would happen without AMBER alerts and if the victim would have been successfully rescued (Griffin, 2010). The authors bias toward the success rate of the AMBER alert system. The author only picked a certain number of cases to study. The author did not mention the total amount of AMBER alerts per year and the success rate of those alerts. If the author mentioned a number of AMBER alerts each year then the reader would have had a better understanding of the success rate compared to the failure
Critique Two: An empirical examination of AMBER Alert ‘successes’
Professor Levy
June 9th, 2015
Amanda Gifford
6/9/15
Critique: An empirical examination of AMBER Alert ‘successes’
MAIN POINT
The author is trying to accomplish to how successful the AMBER alert system is in contributing to the swift recovery of abducted children. The author discusses obstacles to the AMBER alert effectiveness such as the need for a quick response time and the need to make sure the police have attained the crucial information they need for the case. The author attained her research by taking a sample of 243 AMBER alert success stories from the NCMEC along with 93 additional cases. The author then compared the alert effect, relationship …show more content…
The kidnapping ultimately led the creation of the AMBER alert system. The letters AMBER stand for America’s Missing Broadcast Emergency Response. “An AMBER alert is broadcasted when a child is reported missing under circumstances authorities deem dangerous” (Griffin, 2010). An alert is sent to television and radio companies along with cellular telephone service providers. The alerts include information about the victim such as their eye color, weight, height, age, and race. Studies on the effectiveness of the AMBER alert system have shown that in almost one-third of cases the system is proven to be more effective when the cases are less sinister such as custody cases when the child is abducted by a parent. Eighty percent of most success stories in the article involve abductions by a family member or someone known by the victim. Only forty-one percent of the abductions were by strangers and out of the forty-one percent, nineteen were vehicle thefts where the child was not intentionally abducted (Griffin, …show more content…
The AMBER alert system may not save hundreds of lives each year but over a period of time it saves hundreds of lives. Another issue the author has with the AMBER alert system is the alert appeals backfiring against law enforcement. Sometimes calls are a hoax. If it is not a hoax then the police will look incompetent if they do not do anything. If it is a hoax then the police look silly. The response time for a successful AMBER alert is finding the victim within three hours. Even though time is exceeded, it’s impossible to know what would happen without AMBER alerts and if the victim would have been successfully rescued (Griffin, 2010). The authors bias toward the success rate of the AMBER alert system. The author only picked a certain number of cases to study. The author did not mention the total amount of AMBER alerts per year and the success rate of those alerts. If the author mentioned a number of AMBER alerts each year then the reader would have had a better understanding of the success rate compared to the failure