Special Thanks to a Black and Missing reader, Anita, for going through some of my posts and giving me the latest reports. It’s hard enough for me to find articles on the missing on my own, so it’s great that I can depend on some of you guys to help keep the cases updated. Anita informed me that 4 of those who I reported on was found:
Brittany Banks:
Brittany Banks says she’s tired of missing out on a normal adolescence. She never went to a prom, never had a first date. Ever since seven boys allegedly attacked and sexually assaulted her at a Baltimore middle school six years ago, she’s been through dozens of psychiatric wards and residential facilities for troubled youths.
She had hoped to find freedom on the night of Sept. 10, when she jumped out a window of an Upper Marlboro group home where she was supposed to have been under 24-hour supervision. Instead, she found herself homeless. She used her last remaining dollars to take a cab to the New Carrollton train station and a MARC train to Baltimore, where she slept in Druid Hill Park, panhandled and went two days without food.
Yesterday, the 18-year-old was wandering the city’s west side when, she said, one of her former elementary school teachers spotted her. The woman had seen an article Thursday in The Baltimore Sun about Brittany’s disappearance and told the teen that her mother was frantically looking for her. Brittany then walked around the corner to the apartment of a former neighbor, who let her use the phone.
Bridget Banks was at her desk at Morgan State University, where she is an administrative assistant in a vice president’s office, when the phone rang about 9 a.m. She spun around in her seat when she heard the voice of her only child and began to weep.
“Brittany,” she cried, “where are you?”
A colleague gave Bridget Banks a ride to the Pennsylvania Avenue apartment complex where she had lived until 2000 with Brittany, who is classified as mildly mentally retarded. There, she found her daughter in a neighbor’s home looking “like a bag lady.” She hadn’t showered in two weeks. She’d been wearing the same jeans, which were starting to fall down, and had only one change of shirt. She was without the medications prescribed to control her behavior.
On her left temple, a small chunk of her long hair was missing. It was, she said, the only physical harm she suffered when three girls tried to “jump” her on a street in Prince George’s County two days after she ran away. The teen defended herself, recalling, “I could take little skinny girls.” But she lost her cell phone in the altercation, leaving her unable to figure out how to call her mother.
Back at her rented brick rowhouse on the outskirts of the Morgan campus, Bridget Banks marveled that “prayers do come true” as Brittany took a shower and filled her in on what she’d been through. During Thursday night’s storm, she slept under a pavilion in Druid Hill Park to stay dry. “There was a fight over there,” she said. “It looked like someone was pulling out a gun.”
Bridget Banks thanked God that Brittany is alive.
A year ago, mother and daughter had reason to celebrate when they won a $100,000 judgment from the city school system, the maximum permitted by law. They had sued for negligence over what happened Nov. 27, 2002, at Southeast Middle School.
On that day, 12-year-old Brittany was sitting in the back of a math class for special-education students where she was the only girl. According to the lawsuit, a boy went to the back of the room and began fondling her breasts. She called out to the teacher, who continued with her lesson. Six more boys allegedly became involved in throwing her down, climbing on top of her, fondling her and trying to pull off her pants. She eventually kicked and screamed enough to get the boys off her and threw chairs and desks to drive them away.
The incident, which did not involve rape, sent Brittany into an emotional tailspin that required one hospitalization after another. She became a danger to herself and others, exhibiting suicidal and homicidal tendencies. In March 2006, Bridget Banks felt she could not care for her safely and reluctantly turned custody of Brittany over to the state.
Shortly thereafter, both mother and daughter said, Brittany found that she had been placed in close proximity to the boy named in her lawsuit as the lead attacker. Her group home for girls was located across the street from another for boys, with both genders together for school and social activities. He was living there. “That little fool was able to walk up to my child and start [bothering] with her,” Bridget Banks said.
Brittany didn’t tell anyone why she shouldn’t be around the boy, but she began to lash out and was kicked out of the group home.
In the living room of her rowhouse, Bridget Banks keeps a small green journal where she meticulously lists the details of all of her daughter’s hospitalizations and residential placements: 24 of them to date. Brittany’s been with the latest, a group home called All That Matters Inc., since June.
Brittany said the group home isn’t bad, but it’s understaffed, she’s the oldest girl among seven, and she’s rarely allowed out of the house when she’s not going to school.”They try to find a reason not to let you go anywhere,” she said. She said she’s tired of being just another case number.
“The only person who cares about me is my mother,” she said. “She’s been through it all with me.”
Because Brittany turned 18 this year, she has the legal authority to leave the care of the Baltimore City Department of Social Services. A spokeswoman for DSS said there will be a spot for her if she chooses to come back.
She doesn’t want to return to a state placement. Her mother says it’s in her best interest. She’s on track to earn a high school diploma by the spring from an alternative program in Prince George’s County. After that, she hopes to attend Morgan and study music, marine biology or both.
“I’m not going back to no P.G. County,” Brittany told her mother yesterday afternoon as they lounged on the puffy brown couch in the living room, where the teen’s acrylic paintings of landscapes, a bowl of flowers and angels are on display.
“Baby, you’ve got to think,” Bridget Banks implored. “We want to make sure you’re ready to come back home.”
This weekend, Brittany plans to help her mother by trying to fix some problems on her home computer. Brittany was looking forward to relaxing and sleeping in a bed. Bridget Banks said her plans are “to clean her up, love her, hug her, kiss her.”
But by Monday morning, when they’re scheduled to meet with DSS representatives, Brittany has a difficult decision to make. Will she heed her mother’s advice, or venture out on her own?
“I just want a normal life,” she said, “like a normal kid has.”
[Source]
Sha’Kendra Chaney:
A spokesperson for Riviera Beach says that a missing 14-year-old girl from Riviera Beach has been located, after a TV viewer recognized her picture from a newscast.
The viewer called the police to say they recognized Sha’Kendra Chaney, after seeing her picture circulating on the news. The teen was located by authorities and taken back home. Authorities report she is in good health but say she is being interviewed by detectives to determine where she was through her disappearance.
[Source]
Marquilla Love
According to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children website’s Twitter Feed on Sept 18 (the day after I put up a post on her), Marquilla has been recovered. They also took her poster down from the website. However, according to the Tallahassee Democrat paper, she was reported as missing again on Sept 26th. The Tallahassee Official City website also states that she is still missing as of Sept 26th.
So, as much as I want to say that she is found, she may be missing again. If you have her poster up or a post/blog on her up, make sure you let others know this. Keep her face in in mind while you’re on the lookout for other missing persons.
Michelle Sparks:
Michelle Sparks was found safe and returned to her family.
[Source]
Thanks again to Anita!
