Sen. Rubio On Changing Police Policy For Missing Persons
MIAMI (CBSMiami) -- The father of a murdered South Florida woman is on a mission to change how police track down missing adults—even taking his concerns to Senator Marco Rubio.
CBS4's Gaby Fleischman sat down with Rubio to talk about what he called a need for change when it comes to missing persons policy.
"It's a very sad story of course and a horrifying tragedy." said Rubio. "I think there are lessons to be learned from how we treat the missing people in this country."
CLICK HERE TO SEE GABY FLEISCHMAN'S REPORT
Rubio said the murder of 28-year-old Tanya Gonzalez exposes red tape that binds law enforcement from immediate searches in missing adult cases. Policy normally calls for a 48-hour wait period before police start looking.
In Gonzalez's case, family reported her missing on September 9th. The Miami Police Department didn't release a missing person flyer until two days later on September 11th.
"It was a living hell to know that she was missing and it was a living hell to know that I had no support from the people that we all expect the support from," Tanya's father Ramon Gonzalez told CBS4 at a Miami-Dade Commission meeting on October 7th. Gonzalez wants pleaded with commissioners to change policy and make police start looking for missing adults sooner,
From the moment Gonzalez went missing, family suspected her ex-boyfriend Roy Blanco. They said he became jealous and controlling after their break-up. However, investigators didn't name Blanco as a person of interest in the case until six days later. By that time, police say Blanco and his mother had fled to the Florida Keys on a boat. They were even questioned by the Coast Guard and let go because no alert had been put out yet.
A week after Gonzalez disappeared, her body was found in the trunk of her car, just five blocks from Senator Rubio's South Florida home. Gonzalez's body was too decomposed to immediately identify.
"In instances where something unusual has happened I think there has to be exceptions," said Rubio. "I think had those exceptions been in place here it's possible, although perhaps it wouldn't have, it is possible that at a minimum this father would have been able to bury his daughter in a more dignified way as opposed to the way she was ultimately found."
Blanco died in the course of being arrested in the Keys. Police are still investigating whether his death was a suicide or an accidental stabbing.
"I have real concerns about whether local law enforcement did everything it could in those 48 to 72 hours to follow every lead," said Rubio. "Much of the initial discoveries that led to the apprehension of the individual that committed this crime was largely done by the father and people helping him not by local law enforcement."
A spokesperson for the Miami Police Department said they cannot comment about how the department handled the case because it remains an open investigation.
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