Missing people and the Police

My son in law is a policeman in a city centre. It is grubby. You’re entitled to your opinion and me to mine. I don’t see the need to get so affronted,

Casdon

Zoejory

Casdon

According to the police the first missing person report was made to Gwent Police at 7.34pm on Saturday 4th March, so it does look as though the families weren’t originally concerned enough to contact the police either. They probably didn’t realise that all their social media had stopped at the same time until later on that evening when they started piecing the accounts together.

The family had been phoning and a mother of one of the girls was told to stop phoning.

I think 7.34 was the time the police alert went out

No, what I said was correct according to the police report, here it is.
www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/police-lay-out-facts-investigation-26409620

Possibly it was the first time it was logged?

Perhaps other calls by a worried mother were dismissed and not logged.

ExperiencedNotOld

You used those words "grubby lives" to comment on a post of mine so I need to clarify because I'm simply appalled!

I wrote,

". Yes, in an ideal world there would have been extensive earlier searches, but on a Friday night we know all too well from police stats what the police are engaged in of a night - call outs for serious crime or domestics or city centre drinking bout and aggression resulting from the alcohol, or the huge number of sad people with MH problems or found in other kinds of distress”

With the exception of alcohol fuelled city/town centre fracas, the other examples are the simple reality of necessary calls on the police.

Just 8 months ago I had the police out on a domestic abuse incident 11.30 at night

of course call outs to crime calls at night.....and the call outs from the desperate and distressed relate to the lack of other services would you leave people clearly at risk

Grubby?

JaneJudge

I think talking about people's 'grubby lives' is incredibly disrespectful. They are young people, it is normal for them to go out and have fun if they want to and completely acceptable.

I wasn’t talking about those in the car. I was talking about those causing the police so much work.

Zoejory

Casdon

According to the police the first missing person report was made to Gwent Police at 7.34pm on Saturday 4th March, so it does look as though the families weren’t originally concerned enough to contact the police either. They probably didn’t realise that all their social media had stopped at the same time until later on that evening when they started piecing the accounts together.

The family had been phoning and a mother of one of the girls was told to stop phoning.

I think 7.34 was the time the police alert went out

No, what I said was correct according to the police report, here it is.
www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/police-lay-out-facts-investigation-26409620

Zoejory

Casdon

According to the police the first missing person report was made to Gwent Police at 7.34pm on Saturday 4th March, so it does look as though the families weren’t originally concerned enough to contact the police either. They probably didn’t realise that all their social media had stopped at the same time until later on that evening when they started piecing the accounts together.

The family had been phoning and a mother of one of the girls was told to stop phoning.

I think 7.34 was the time the police alert went out

Yes.

That poor mother. I'd be very angry indeed.
Friends and families had to go out searching themselves.

Casdon

According to the police the first missing person report was made to Gwent Police at 7.34pm on Saturday 4th March, so it does look as though the families weren’t originally concerned enough to contact the police either. They probably didn’t realise that all their social media had stopped at the same time until later on that evening when they started piecing the accounts together.

The family had been phoning and a mother of one of the girls was told to stop phoning.

I think 7.34 was the time the police alert went out

Callistemon21

Casdon

According to the police the first missing person report was made to Gwent Police at 7.34pm on Saturday 4th March, so it does look as though the families weren’t originally concerned enough to contact the police either. They probably didn’t realise that all their social media had stopped at the same time until later on that evening when they started piecing the accounts together.

The car was found in an area which is policed by South Wales Police, too.

Yes, I also heard on the Welsh news that some of the reports about the young people had gone to South Wales police and some to Gwent police because the two men were from Cardiff and the girls from Newport, so that information had to be joined up. It’s so tragic, and there will be an inquiry but I don’t think people should jump to blame the police for failings as yet.

I think talking about people's 'grubby lives' is incredibly disrespectful. They are young people, it is normal for them to go out and have fun if they want to and completely acceptable.

Casdon

According to the police the first missing person report was made to Gwent Police at 7.34pm on Saturday 4th March, so it does look as though the families weren’t originally concerned enough to contact the police either. They probably didn’t realise that all their social media had stopped at the same time until later on that evening when they started piecing the accounts together.

The car was found in an area which is policed by South Wales Police, too.

JaneJudge

I'm glad there is a thread about this as I can;t understand why the police DID NOT check the roundabout as several enquiries have stated when cars go missing with people in who haven;t returned home, it is one of the things they should do

The inside of that car for that 48 hours doesn't even bear thinking about . If the other two survive I guess they may have a story to tell

love to their families. They are going to need all the support they can get

They had travelled some distance that night, though, perhaps no-one realised they had taken that route back again so it could have been looking for a needle in a haystack.

However, an alert could have gone out earlier if not a full-scale search.

I'm glad there is a thread about this as I can;t understand why the police DID NOT check the roundabout as several enquiries have stated when cars go missing with people in who haven;t returned home, it is one of the things they should do

The inside of that car for that 48 hours doesn't even bear thinking about . If the other two survive I guess they may have a story to tell

love to their families. They are going to need all the support they can get

According to the police the first missing person report was made to Gwent Police at 7.34pm on Saturday 4th March, so it does look as though the families weren’t originally concerned enough to contact the police either. They probably didn’t realise that all their social media had stopped at the same time until later on that evening when they started piecing the accounts together.

Blaming doesn't help but the police need to realise that these families will have been so concerned due to the fact not one of them had been on social media since 2am.

The girls were prolific users of Instagram etc. They'd posted photos of them getting ready. Setting out. They met the two boys and posted photos of them.

For all 5 of them to go silent indicates a big problem. Perfectly acceptable for the parents to be worried.

When I was young I'd not always go home after a night out. We had no mobile phones. No social media. Mum would raise her eyebrows when I stumbled home.

It's a different world now.

Just such a tragic event. The poor families.

Wyllow3 - a very reasonable post. The police are swamped with the detritus of grubby lives. You can’t blame them.

Germanshepherdsmum

Riverwalk

Germanshepherdsmum

I guess the likelihood of five young people together having gone missing is pretty remote, to be fair to the police.

I'm puzzled by 'to be fair to the police'.

The likelihood is indeed pretty remote, bearing in mind young peoples propensity for social media/phone usage, and I would have thought an immediate search would have been initiated.

I'm not one to criticise the police as a first reaction but FIVE people must be unique and should have raised alarm bells.

What I meant was that five young people are more likely to have decided to go and find some fun together rather than harm having come to them.

But surely they'd be posting what they were doing on Facebook, Instagram or other social media sites.

I'm sure at least one or two of them, if not all, would have been in touch with their families too.

Yes, it is a very tragic story, three young people dead (did they die on impact or could they have been saved?) and two more fighting for their lives in hospital.

They had been on quite a journey, at a nightclub in Newport, then down to Porthcawl then back to the other side of Cardiff again.
So I can understand the police might not have known where to start looking but they should have taken this more seriously; the time lapse was quite significant.

It was obvious it was unusual for them to go missing as parents were phoning the police, worried that their children had not returned home ot been in touch.

There are now systems being developed where if a car crashes it automatically alerts emergency services with location. I’m not sure if any are active in the UK, I seem to remember it was linked to a new EU navigation system, anyone else have any more information on that

There was an accident near here a few years ago.
One of the cars involved had this built in and alerted the emergency services when the driver didn't respond.

On a personal level, and more accessible to us as individuals, my Google Pixel phone also has this feature.
It's in the Settings under "Safety and Emergency."
Worth checking your own?

I don't think we can blame the police.

None of the young people were on any kind of vulnerable register: they were all fit, well, capable: I too would make the assumption that it was too early for an all out search so very early on as in above post because

"What I meant was that five young people are more likely to have decided to go and find some fun together rather than harm having come to them."

Why do we always look for someone to "Blame"? this was an awful, tragic, accident: its sheer chance the accident was concealed from a really well used road.

Looking earlier would not have made any difference to the outcome. Yes, in an ideal world there would have been extensive earlier searches, but on a Friday night we know all too well from police stats what the police are engaged in of a night - call outs for serious crime or domestics or city centre drinking bout and aggression resulting from the alcohol, or the huge number of sad people with MH problems or found in other kinds of distress -

they just cant cover them all at the moment.

I wouldn't expect 5 young people to literally go dark... not contacting friends, family or updating social media... not all 5 for at the same moment.

I think this is a tragedy that should have been taken very seriously from the beginning and I truly hope none of those young people died or could die from wounds that could have been treated if found earlier

Family should be heard, they know their relatives, we can't just have a model of a person to work around or a model of a situation... investigate concerns

It terrifies me, this could be my own child one day and if I wasn't heard I'd be losing my mind

This young man went out looking. He saw the tyre tracks going over the roundabout. Then he found the car.

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11831023/Man-best-friend-dead-Cardiff-car-crash-slams-police-missed-wreckage.html

A few years ago in Hull, a car of young people hit a tree on an urban road with houses on both sides during the night. The youngsters in the car were found the next morning when people were out and about all unfortunately dead.
The noise of the impact was presumed not to have been loud enough to alert people who were asleep. A great tragedy for their families and non were from far away.

Riverwalk

Germanshepherdsmum

I guess the likelihood of five young people together having gone missing is pretty remote, to be fair to the police.

I'm puzzled by 'to be fair to the police'.

The likelihood is indeed pretty remote, bearing in mind young peoples propensity for social media/phone usage, and I would have thought an immediate search would have been initiated.

I'm not one to criticise the police as a first reaction but FIVE people must be unique and should have raised alarm bells.

What I meant was that five young people are more likely to have decided to go and find some fun together rather than harm having come to them.

It's a road we use regularly and it's understandable how the many hundreds of cars passing did not notice anything, it's on a sliproad which drops to 30 before reaching the roundabout, so not a fast road.
So sad for the families concerned.

Katie59

Having driven some of those roads around the south Wales valleys it’s easy to run off the road into forest land and be invisible. If the route they were taking was not known finding would be a needle in a haystack.

There are now systems being developed where if a car crashes it automatically alerts emergency services with location. I’m not sure if any are active in the UK, I seem to remember it was linked to a new EU navigation system, anyone else have any more information on that.

No the road was not one in the valley one but quite near houses and a roundabout with what looked like CCTV up on the poles , what I can't understand is that they tracked them to a seaside resort they knew that had been to they must have been on on the M4, then why they couldn't track the return journey.