The family of an 88-year-old man who was found dead in Delta, B.C., is pushing for a “silver alert” system to help locate missing seniors, similar to the Amber Alerts used to find missing children.
A huge community search for Jarnail Sanghera, who suffered from dementia, ended in tragedy when his body was found in a wooded area near the Alex Fraser Bridge on Sunday, after he disappeared May 15 from his nearby home.
His family has started an online petition calling on the province to implement a better system to find vulnerable seniors when they go missing.
“What we learned throughout this traumatic experience of trying to find our grandfather was that there is just not enough urgency and information readily available to people,” grandson Rajpal Fagurha said.
“In this day and age of technology, we think that having something like B.C. Silver Alert will definitely help find somebody at a faster pace.”
The petition had nearly 12,000 signatures as of late Wednesday afternoon.
Public Safety Minister Mike Farnworth has said police have not asked for a silver alert system, citing concerns about “alert fatigue” if the public were to receive too many notifications.
Sam Noh has long advocated for a silver alert after his father, Shin Noh, who suffered from Alzheimer’s disease, went missing in Coquitlam in 2013 and has never been found.
In the wake of Sanghera’s death, Noh told Global News that geo-targeting messages could help, as missing seniors rarely stray far from home.
“You don’t need to notify the whole province for a missing senior with dementia,” he said.
“You could geo-target alerts to target certain communities that are relevant.”
— With files from Ted Chernecki
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