New Brunswick proposes Missing Persons Act: ‘It will help the next people’

Cheryl Beddow hopes proposed legislation in New Brunswick can help other families avoid the pain her loved ones have endured over the past year.

Introduced on Wednesday, the Missing Persons Act is intended to provide more power to law enforcement in cases where there is not an ongoing criminal investigation.

For Beddow, whose father Paul Doughty has been missing since Aug. 19, 2021, the barriers in accessing information came as a shock.

“With my dad missing, I was unable to get even the simple things like his cellphone records, being as there was no criminality suspected,” she said.

“The officer had mentioned that if the Missing Persons Act was in effect, it would be easier to get a hold of stuff like that.”

As a result, in working with other New Brunswickers who experienced similar struggles during missing persons investigations, Beddow created a petition to implement the act.

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To further the momentum, talks began with local MLAs in hopes of introducing legislation already passed in other provinces.

According to a provincial news release, the proposed legislation would allow police officers to request information from a person’s records. It would require an emergency/urgent demand, an order for the production of records, or a search warrant.

The release adds information could include signals from a wireless device, cellphone records, instant messaging and GPS tracking records.

Currently, when there is no criminal investigation, law enforcement agencies have no ability to compel individuals or corporations to release personal information about the missing person, the release states.

“That will allow law enforcement agencies to conduct a missing person investigation to the best of their ability,” Public Safety Minister Kris Austin said on Wednesday.

“I’m very pleased to present this bill, and it will go a long way in helping solve some of those issues around missing persons.”

Beddow said the legislation wouldn’t help her family, but believes a reduced amount of red tape could ease the process for other families.

“There could have been maybe a conversation he had with somebody that might have led us in a different direction, hopefully someday we’ll know that, but I don’t know a lot of time’s passed for us. It will help the next people,” she said.

The Missing Persons Act will return to the legislature next week for second reading.

1:56 Family start own search efforts for missing New Brunswick man