JUSTICE DEPARTMENT HONORS NEW HAMPSHIRE CITIZEN AT
NATIONAL AMBER ALERT SYMPOSIUM

WASHINGTON, D.C. - Marilyn Roberts, Deputy Administrator for the Office of Justice Programs' (OJP) Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (OJJDP), presented Mike Grant with the AMBER Alert Citizen Award at the National AMBER Alert Symposium in Phoenix, AZ.

Mike Grant, of Milton, NH, responded to an AMBER Alert for a 2-year-old girl on November 9, 2009. The girl's father abducted her after breaking into her mother's home and assaulting her mother. Mike Grant heard the AMBER Alert, issued throughout Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire. When Grant recognized the pickup truck described in the alert, he approached the vehicle and convinced the girl's father to turn himself in to the police. The girl was rescued and reunited with her mother.

"Keeping the AMBER Alert system vital and powerful relies on the work of many partners and supporters," said Laurie O. Robinson, Assistant Attorney General for OJP and National AMBER Alter Coordinator. "Our ongoing commitment is to improve and strengthen the AMBER Alert network to protect all children and rescue them if they are abducted or missing."

This year, during the National AMBER Alert Symposium, OJP recognized individual or collective efforts to protect children from abduction and to recover missing or abducted children. Award categories are:

• AMBER Alert Coordinator of the Year
• AMBER Alert Broadcaster/Media Person of the Year
• AMBER Alert Law Enforcement Leadership Award
• AMBER Alert Citizen Award

The AMBER (America's Missing: Broadcast Emergency Response) Alert system began in 1996 when Dallas-Fort Worth broadcasters teamed with local police to develop an early warning system to help find abducted children. The system was created in memory of nine-year-old Amber Hagerman of Arlington, Texas, who was abducted while riding her bicycle and later found murdered. AMBER Alerts are emergency messages broadcast when a law enforcement agency determines that a child has been abducted and is in imminent danger. For more information about the AMBER Alert program, please visit https://amberalert.ojp.gov/redirect-legacy/.

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The Office of Justice Programs (OJP), headed by Assistant Attorney General Laurie O. Robinson, provides federal leadership in developing the nation?s capacity to prevent and control crime, administer justice, and assist victims. OJP has seven bureaus and offices: the Bureau of Justice Assistance; the Bureau of Justice Statistics; the National Institute of Justice; the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention; the Office for Victims of Crime; the Community Capacity Development Office, and the Office of Sex Offender Sentencing, Monitoring, Apprehending, Registering, and Tracking (SMART). More information about OJP and its components can be found at https://ojp.gov.