On January 27th 2020 the El Paso County Sheriff’s Department was called around 6:55pm and was informed of a “runaway child“, 11 year old Gannon Stauch. Due to the reporting party, Gannon’s Stepmother, alluding to a runaway situation the police response time was longer than it would have been in a typical missing child case and when they arrived *based on info provided by the present caregiver* they listed Gannon as a runaway losing critical and valuable time that could’ve been spent getting leads on this case.

It is said that after the first 72 hours the chances of finding a child are dramatically reduced. Within the first 72 hours the community was not informed of a missing and possibly endangered child. After 3 days they finally upgraded Gannon to a missing and endangered person..

I created this petition with the intent to change how juveniles under a certain age are classified when missing, regardless of whether they’re reported as a runaway.

In the state of Colorado, and in most states, it isn’t safe to leave an 11 year old unsupervised for more than 3 hours.. at the 3 hour mark at least, Gannon should’ve been considered missing and in danger.

Edit: this petition is not to chastise or condemn local law enforcement.. I believe they’ve been working very hard to bring closure to this case and with the information they were provided initially, I believe they did what they thought was best. However, I also believe that those first few hours were critical and that in the future a child under 13 years old should be automatically listed as missing/endangered after a certain period of time not more than 3 hours missing without contact regardless of whether they’re suspected of or reported as running away.