Jaycee Lee Dugard

Unlike the last missing person I have mentioned, this one has been found alive.

On June 10, 1991, 11-year-old Jaycee Lee Dugard was last seen by her stepfather being abducted at her school bus stop, in South Lake Tahoe, CA.

On August 27, 2009, 18 years later, a 29-year-old woman entered a police station in Northern California, claiming to be Jaycee Lee Dugard. Before the end of the day, her identity had been confirmed.

The news traveled fast, and before long, it was all over the USA. The captors, now safely locked away, had forced her to work as a sex slave during her 18 years of captivity, along with two daughters she had with her male captor, Phillip Garrido.

You don't need me to provide a link for you on this story. Just type "Jaycee Lee Dugard" into any search engine, and you can spend all day picking out which articles you want to read about her.

The question that weighs on my mind now is how the child's development has been affected. Those 18 years were among the most important years of her life, including the rest of her childhood, all through her teens, and into early adulthood, During captivity, Jaycee and the other girls have never been to school, or had any contact with the rest of the world. I can't help wondering what her rehabilitation will be like.

The good news, of course, is that Jaycee now has a chance at a normal life. But how much of a chance remains to be seen. Still, it is not often that any person, child or adult, who has been missing for over a decade, is ever found alive. In this regard, we can say she is indeed very fortunate.
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Of all the missing persons websites I know of, I believe it was the Charley Project that was the first to cover this story. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
http://charleyross.wordpress.com/