ARLINGTON, Wash. — Nearly a year after Jonathan Hoang was first reported missing from his Arlington home, his family is continuing to fight for change in Olympia.
Jonathan was 21 years old when he disappeared and has autism.
His family has told KOMO News it was unlike Jonathan to leave home without telling anyone, and some of his loved ones believe Jonathan may have been taken against his will. Information that the family also claims was shared with law enforcement from day one.
“Every day, we wake up and go look in his room. Just hoping he shows up,” said Thao Hoang, Jonathan’s father. “It’s really a living nightmare that we don’t wish on anyone at all.”
Jonathan’s family was disappointed to learn that Washington state doesn’t have a specific alert system for missing adults with disabilities like Jonathan.
An Endangered Missing Persons Advisory (EMPA) was issued by the Washington State Patrol (WSP) five days after Jonathan was reported missing.
Required criteria to issue an EMPA include a person who is missing and in danger because of their age, physical, or mental health, severe weather conditions, or if they’re not able to safely return home without assistance, according to the WSP website.
The WSP confirmed to KOMO News that an EMPA was issued once the investigative agency, the Snohomish County Sheriff’s Office, requested one with the required criteria. KOMO News has asked the sheriff’s office why the request took five days.
Now, Jonathan’s family is supporting Senate Bill 6070, or the “Purple Alert Bill.” The proposed legislation would create Purple Alerts for missing adults with cognitive or developmental disabilities.
“With the Purple Alert, it’s going to set a standard set of protocols that require the alert to be issued immediately,” Thao explained. “It’s not subject to local law enforcement. It takes the guesswork out.”
The hope is that designated Purple Alerts would become widely recognizable by law enforcement and the public, eventually becoming comparable to Amber Alerts, which are issued for missing children.
Purple Alert advisories would be displayed on “variable message signs,” or electronic signs seen along highways, and in the “text of the highway advisory radio messages,” heard by travelers over the radio, according to the bill.
SB 6070 passed out of the state Senate earlier this month and has been introduced in the state House. The bill is scheduled for a public hearing in the House Committee on Community Safety on Monday, Feb. 23, at 1:30 p.m.
Jonathan’s father, Thao, plans to speak in support of the bill during the hearing. While Thao recognizes it’s too late for a Purple Alert to help with his family’s search for Jonathan, he said he will continue pushing for the change to help others across the state.
“When it’s passed, it’s going to help a lot more people recover and not go through the nightmare that our family is going through today,” he said.