RUSKIN, Fla. — When a 9-year-old boy with autism went missing this weekend in Ruskin, one lifesaving tool helped Hillsborough County deputies find him within minutes.
The child’s mother, Erica Rodgers, could not have been more grateful this past Thanksgiving weekend when deputies used the SafetyNet system to find her son Elijah.
“It works,” Rodgers said. "It works.”
The sheriff's office received a call just before 6 p.m. Sunday saying Elijah had run away from the family's Ruskin home.
Elijah is autistic and has disappeared several times before, but this time, within 30 minutes, Hillsborough County deputies were able to hone in on a signal from the 9-year-old’s ankle bracelet and locate him, unharmed behind a neighbor’s house a couple of streets away.
The GPS tracking bracelet is provided by SafetyNet, a program that partners with law enforcement agencies across the country.
SafetyNet helps agencies locate people at risk of wandering or getting lost due to cognitive conditions like Alzheimer's disease, dementia or, in this case, autism.
The program has been around for a little over a decade, but thanks to law enforcement body cameras we can now see its effectiveness in action.
Rodgers says they do all they can to try to keep Elijah from running away. They’ve installed special door locks, signaling devices, cameras – and even decals from the sheriff’s office on their doors letting visitors know there’s an autistic child in the house.
“Now that he has that bracelet on there's no more of that,” the mom said. “They go ahead and put the system out - put it... put the coordinates out - and they find him.”
As a mom, she says she knows her son and can almost guarantee that this won't be the last time Elijah runs away.
But it's comforting, she says, that people in their neighborhood, Elijah's friends, and the Hillsborough County sheriff’s office along with the SafetyNet are all willing to help locate him as quickly as possible.
“And to know that I have the Hillsborough County sheriff’s office willing to help me find him when he goes missing, it makes me and my family feel very safe and very secure,” Rodgers said. “And I am very appreciative of that program.”
Caregivers who want to sign their loved one up for SafetyNet through Hillsborough County can do so here.