Disturbing figures show child abduction rates in the past year
As the search for missing 4-year-old Cleo Smith continues, some alarming statistics have emerged on the number of child abductions in Western Australia in the past 12 months.
According to WA Police records, there were 15 seperate incidents of kidnapping and "child stealing" in the last financial year.
Seven of those incidents have occurred this year alone.
Four happened in the Perth metro area, but one happened in the Mid West/Gascoyne region where Cleo disappeared in the early hours of October 16th.
The disturbing figures show there have been a total of 328 abductions in Western Australia since January 2007.
Thirteen of those have occurred in the Mid West/Gascoyne region where Cleo Smith was last seen.
Despite these confronting figures, a WA Police spokesperson said Cleo’s suspected abduction is “highly unusual” and “incredibly rare” because of the specific circumstances.
They went on to say that most kidnapping and child-stealing incidents are usually related to family custody matters.
The WA Police website defines kidnapping or child-stealing as “the abducting of a person against their will and depriving them of their personal liberty.”
This can include the taking of minors with the intent to deprive a person of the “lawful care of the child,” as well as “fraudulently enticing the child away” and “receiving/harbouring a child”.
At this stage of the investigation into Cleo Smith's disappearance, police have named no suspects, and believe her parents are not involved.
Cleo went missing from a family tent at the Blowholes campsite at Macleod, near Carnarvon, in the early hours of October 16th.
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