The nine months leading up the bill's introduction involved the standard Bill Research and Drafting stages. A week after the Senate's bill was introduced, Assemblyman Gordon Johnson and Assemblywoman Valerie Huttle joined on as primary sponsors and introduced the equivalent Assembly version of the Bill, A3643. I am very proud to say that New Jersey ultimately became the fourth state to pass new missing persons legislation based on the original model originally constructed by teams of experts at the Department of Justice in 2005.
Over the next year, I visited Trenton to testify three times as we went down to the wire. New Jersey laws must be passed within the two-year legislative session window. We actually ended up needing to go into the last "extended" week on the session in the first week of 2008 to get the bill through the Assembly Appropriations committee and then to a final Assembly vote of 80-0 on the last day of the session, Jan. 7, 2008. See News12 NJ Video.
Briefly, "Patricia's Law" ensures that a missing persons report will be taken immediately, regardless of the circumstances or age of the missing person. Law enforcement no longer will tell New Jersey families to come back in a few days when their missing loved has vanished. The report intake process has been standardized to a specific list of questions about the missing person. A determination will be made immediately if the person is considered "High Risk", in which case, the efforts are expedited further.
Regardless, of "High Risk" status, the missing persons information is entered into the National Crime Information Center or NCIC with the first few hours well as all the other critical databases as outlined in "Patricia's Law". Other agencies, such as the NJ State Police can then be called in to help. If the person is still missing after 30 days, law enforcement will request a DNA sample of the missing person from the missing person's family. If that is not available, a DNA reference sample will be obtained from the missing person's family. Law enforcement will then process the sample using the University of North Texas - Center for Human Identification (UNTCHI).
Throughout the information intake process and throughout the investigation, law enforcement will now be required to communication case process to the family of the missing and inform the missing person's family about the existence of National Centers, which can help the families further.
Death scene investigations and recovery procedures have also been enhanced to also mandate DNA extraction and processing. Training will also be provided to law enforcement.
As mentioned earlier, the road to getting "Patricia's Law" passed had not been an easy one and it involved at least three (3) trips to Trenton to testify in front of various committees. Early on in the process, I had to learn how NJ passes a law.
After all those trips to Trenton, the letter writing and lunchtime telecom with Appropriations Committee Chair Assemblywoman Nellie Pou, we did make it and New Jersey will be a safer place for it. I might add that as our Bills
progressed through all the committees and into the final Senate and Assembly session votes, there was never a "NO" vote
from any of our legislators. This certainly verifies their understanding of the importance of this Bill, now a law.
There were several speakers, including myself, Gov. Corzine, AG Anne Milgram, the Bogota Chief, our Primary sponsors Sen. Loretta Weinberg, Assemblyman Gordon Johnson, and reps from the state police. Each person who spoke detailed "Patricia's Law" how I should be so proud (and I sure am) and thanked me for my efforts. It was a day I will never forget. Gov. Corzine started by talking about the day Pat vanished and lead up to my efforts on the Bill. At one point he asked me to stand to be recognized and the crowd of around 40-50 law enforcement (Bogota PD, State Police, Bergen County Sheriff), family, elected officials and media gave me a round of applause. I was so touched by all the proceedings and it was more than I ever imaged would happen. After all the speeches, I was invited with family and sponsors to the other side of the room where the Bill and a series of "special Jon Corzine pens" were arranged. Gov. Corzine proceeded to sign the bill letter by letter with each pen and gave them out to us (16 pens). Naturally, I have one and was given a copy of the signed Bill.
The AG made an incredible announcement that they have been working with Center for Human Identification (CHI) in the University of North Texas with George Adams and his team and have established a partnership with them in compliance with our new Law for them to handle all of NJs DNA processing. In fact, they are currently reaching out to all the families of the current missing in NJ who do not have their DNA in CODIS to get the sample (or family reference sample)and send it to CHI for processing. In addition, they have already polled all the ME offices throughout NJ and will be having the DNA of all the 272 unidentified deceased extracted and sent to CHI. As you can image, I was amazed that the AG had taken these advance steps to "do the right thing" and serve as a model for all states.
I had no idea the State Police and the Attorney General's office were so far along and my next step was to start to do the same. The AG indicated that our legislation came along at a perfect time and everything came together. This is what we need all states to do.
They expect to start to solve many long term cases (> 30days) and have already had some hits.
With Hope Always,
Jim Viola
Still Missing my wife, Patricia Viola
Bogota, NJ - 2/13/01 - Bergen County - USA
Jim Viola recently had an Age Progression to Age 50 for
a recent missing persons conference he attended last month.
Diana did an outstanding job of capturing what Pat would probably will look like now at age 50. Six different variations found on web site
