The United States is suffering a crisis of unsolved homicides and missing persons cases. According to the Murder Accountability Project, over 220,000 homicides since 1980 remain unsolved. In the past ten years (2013-2023), the national homicide clearance rate was just 57.69%. [1] There are presently more than 25,000 missing persons, over 15,000 unidentified persons, and more than 18,000 unclaimed persons in the United States, per NamUs (National Missing and Unidentified Persons System). Many of these are long-term cases; the average case age for missing persons is 17.7 years, unidentified 22.8 years, and unclaimed 5.9 years. [2]
Murdered and missing Americans and their families deserve justice, no matter how new or old their case may be. Services and technologies such as national databases, odontology, DNA, and forensic anthropology and genealogy have markedly improved in recent years, yet they have not been utilized to their full potential.
Furthermore, Operation Lady Justice (E.O. 13898), a multiagency taskforce designed to allocate resources to bring justice for missing and murdered Indigenous persons, has been abandoned by the Biden-Harris Administration. In March of this year, Representative Ryan Zinke (MT-1) announced that $19 million promised funds have not been disbursed by the Biden-Harris Administration for this purpose. [3]
President Trump has already demonstrated his commitment to criminal justice, and in his second term should significantly increase federal resources and programs to 1) prevent crime, particularly homicide 2) ensure offenders are properly apprehended and 3) provide closure and dignity to victims and their families. Specific action items should include:
- Reinstate Operation Lady Justice, ensuring adequate funding (including disbursement of funds withheld by the Biden-Harris Administration) and staffing.
- As part of deportation proceedings, create offender profiles for all known violent criminals (whether convicted in the United States or their country of origin), including fingerprints and DNA samples. DNA should be uploaded to the National DNA Index System (NDIS).
- Reduce turnaround time for DNA and other forensic testing by providing federal assistance for training and hiring technicians.
- Create grants and/or programs to support continued education and training for smaller or underfunded local law enforcement agencies.
- Provide grants to acquire and enhance technology for smaller or underfunded local law enforcement agencies, including but not limited to case management software, digitization of paper records, digital forensic software, drones, automatic license plate recognition, etc.
- Express support for bipartisan VICTIM Act, introduced by Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ) and co-sponsored by Senators John Kennedy (R-LA), Richard Durbin (D-IL), and Thomas Tillis (R-NC).
- Provide tax credits to offset costs of private investigations of homicides and missing persons tax deductible for victims’ immediate family members, which must be repaid in full if convicted of associated crime.
- Make all monetary rewards disbursed for assistance in solving a murder or missing persons case entirely tax-exempt.
- All noncitizens (legal or illegal) convicted of murder, homicide, or manslaughter of any degree, rape, and/or child sex crimes, and any convicted noncitizen accomplice(s), must be immediately deported upon release from prison and permanently banned from entering the United States.
- Task the newly created Department of Government Efficiency with consolidating redundant administrative roles and ensuring said roles are filled by competent and diligent workers; streamlining national databases and other investigative tools; removing regulations and unnecessary bureaucracy to facilitate greater interstate and interagency cooperation.
Input from a variety of law enforcement agencies (federal, state, local; rural, suburban, urban) should also be sought to best determine how the government can best support investigative efforts while protecting Americans’ civil liberties and avoiding frivolous spending.