Latest update April 19th, 2024 12:59 AM
Jul 22, 2014 Editorial
At the time of writing this column the whereabouts of school teacher Nyozi Goodman remain unknown. The fact that not one word has been heard from the young lady is enough to suggest that something serious has happened to her. It is unhelpful to speculate about what has befallen Nyozi, but in all fairness to the quantity of law enforcement resources which have gone into investigating this case of a missing person, it is only right that we inform ourselves of a few issues.
Ms. Goodman left for the National Sports Hall and expected to be picked up by some unnamed person or persons. At this point it is not unreasonable to assume that Goodman might have disappeared of her own volition, but that would be a most unconscionable act bearing in mind the suffering her relatives are experiencing at this time.
Indeed there have been instances in the past where men and women have disappeared themselves for reasons best known only to them. Sometimes discouragement and self-pity combine to make some people want to forget everything and everyone they have ever known.
Among the discovered reasons for these acts of self-disappearance are: an unbearable marriage or other relationship gone sour; to avoid imminent prosecution for a criminal act; as a means of escape from marital and/or parental obligations; running to the lure of an illicit relationship; in the commission of insurance fraud; or being a habitual illegal drug user/abuser.
Whatever the cause of a disappearance, families are disrupted; the taxpayers’ money is diverted into directing additional police efforts away from other immediate mandatory duties. Interestingly in some quarters, voluntary disappearance is considered to be a symbolic form of suicide, since both the missing person and the suicide are basically trying to obliterate themselves and their identity by seeking to escape a life that has become unbearable to them.
In a word, voluntary disappearances without notification are downright selfish, and should attract sanctions to deter other similar actions when the missing person resurfaces. However, the fact remains that there is no law against voluntary disappearance; and as soon as the police are convinced that the person has done nothing illegal, and that the act was voluntary, their interest ends.
The California Department of Justice missing persons’ database lists adults with what appears to be a default classification of “voluntary missing adult” for cases where an adult that goes missing is not known to have any serious medical conditions, or where there are no obvious signs of foul play.
Although adults have the right to go missing and may in fact may not be officially missing, police resources are consumed by following up on these missing-adult cases to determine the circumstances.
To commit suicide or to go missing voluntarily are essentially selfish things to do because of the confusion and guilt that many families experience, sometimes for the rest of their lives.
One significant difference between the two is with the suicide the family most times has a body to bury and bring closure. However, people should not be too quick to rush to judgment when these things occur because there might well be a lot else going on that no one else will ever know.
On the other hand involuntary disappearances may be considered as occurring in circumstances which include: child-custody abductions; homicide; international abductions as renditions; human trafficking; kidnapping; and natural disasters. Guyanese do not experience natural disasters on the scale where significant numbers of persons go missing.
In situations where missing persons are not reported as missing to the police they are likely to be discovered as victims of foul play. Prostitutes, both male and female, are particularly vulnerable to becoming victims of homicide or even of serial murders. The unexplained disappearance of prostitutes should raise red flags.
It is to be hoped that the police would have contacted the telephone service provider for assistance with Nyozi Goodman’s phone records. The longer Ms. Goodman remains missing without word being received of any sightings, there is a strong possibility that her disappearance might have been involuntary, and therefore our prayers are with her family at this time.
Please share this to every Guyanese including your house cats.
Apr 19, 2024
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