DONNA BARNHILL - 13 yo (1981) - Lexington NC

A national organization is working to renew interest in the case
of a teenager from Lexington who disappeared 30 years ago this week.
Donna Barnhill, who was 13 at the time, was last seen March 18, 1981, walking
along Hemstead Street as she headed to a friend’s house. Searches for
her over the years have turned up few leads.
The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, a nonprofit
organization based in Alexandria, Va., is highlighting Barnhill’s case
as part of the anniversary of her disappearance. The center has sent a
news release about Barnhill to media outlets across the United States.
Included is a photograph of the girl taken near the time of her
disappearance and a computer-generated, age-enhanced picture that would
show what she might look like today at the age of 43.




Melinda Stevens, director of the Missing Children’s Division of the National
Center, said cases like Barnhill’s — where the child isn’t found, either
dead or alive — are rare. She said the center has a 97.5 percent
recovery rate. Since the organization was founded in 1984, of the
174,242 cases of missing children on which they’ve worked, 160,419
children have been recovered.
Of the 12,033 cases reported to the center since Jan. 1, 2010, a total of 11,972 have been solved.
Stevens said work at the center continues on all cases until a resolution is reached.
“Thank goodness, only a small percentage are not recovered,” she said.
Stevens said the organization only has bits of information about Barnhill’s
case. She said the center doesn’t have the name of a family contact as
they do with the majority of cases with which they’re involved. The
Lexington Police Department is the only contact the center has in the
Barnhill case, Stevens said.
She said the purpose of the center is to keep alive interest in the cases
of missing and exploited children. The hope, Stevens said, is that
someone will see information they’ve put out, then call the center or
the local police department.
“We hope they’ll call and say, ‘I think I saw this child,’” Stevens said.
The center was established by Congress in 1984. Center workers staff a
hotline 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Stevens said that since its
inception, the center has fielded more than 2.5 million phone calls from
individuals wishing to provide information about a missing or exploited
child.
Det. Aimee Harvey of the Lexington Police Department is the lead investigator on the case
involving Barnhill’s disappearance. She was given command of the case in 2009.
Harvey said that when a case involves a missing child, it is never considered closed until a resolution is reached.
“We’re always working on the case,” she said.
Harvey said that in recent years, samples of DNA from one of Barnhill’s
relatives have been sent to a national database. Should Barnhill’s body
be found and a DNA sample submitted to the database, it would indicate a
match and lead to her identification.
“That’s really important,” Harvey said of the DNA submission.
She said both of Barnhill’s parents are dead. Two of her brothers and
a sister still live in Davidson County, Harvey said.
She said the DNA submission is not the only work police have dedicated to
the Barnhill case in recent years. Harvey said that on Oct. 30, 2009,
officers again searched the family’s former residence on Hemstead
Street. Ground-penetrating radar was used, and cadavar dogs were brought to the site.
“Nothing was found,” Harvey said.
She said the file on the case at the police department is large.
“Years and years of work,” Harvey said of its contents.
She said local police welcome the assistance of the National Center for
Missing & Exploited Children in attempts to solve the case.
“They help to get things rolling,” Harvey said.


http://www.the-dispatch.com/article/20110316/News/303169979/-1/sports?p=all&tc=pgall