Missing Woman: Leslie Smith--KS--01/26/2004

[Denise]

http://www.kansasmissing.com/Smith2004.html

Lesley M. Smith

Date Missing: January 26, 2004
Place Missing: Lawrence, Kansas
Date of Birth: January 23, 1966
Age at Time of Disappearance: 38
Height: 5'2"
Weight: 115 lbs.
Hair Color: Black
Eye Color: Blue
Known Clothing: A Kansas City Chiefs coat and white tennis shoes.

Lesley was last seen watching television at her mom and stepfather's residence on Quail Creek Drive in Lawrence, Kansas at 10:30 PM on January 26, 2004. The next morning when her mother woke up, Lesley was not in the home. She left a note which alluded to medication and said "I love you so much." Lesley's parent's brown 1990 Plymouth Voyager minivan was also missing, and she left behind her purse, dirver's license, and asthma inhaler. She did however take her cell phone, and her family have left numerous messages on her voice mail, but none of the messages have been retrieved since her disappearance. The minivan has never been recovered and Leslie may still be driving it, and the driver side mirror is missing. The minivan has a Kansas license plate number PNG271. Leslie's family do not believe she left of her own accord, and they stated she would have taken her belongings with her. She was a server at the Bella Lounge at the time of her disappearance, and has not used her bank accounts or her social security number sincer she disappeared. Lesley has contact in the Topeka and Kansas City areas, and her case remians unsolved.

Investigating Agency:

Lawrence Police Department
785-841-7210
785-830-7446

If you have any information regarding the disappearance of Lesley, please contact the above agency!

[Denise]

Article from 3/04

Law hinders search for missing daughter

The parents of a missing Lawrence woman say a new medical-privacy law is making it harder to find their daughter, who they fear might be dead or kidnapped.

Lesley Smith's parents want Bert Nash Community Mental Health Center to provide them with phone records they think might yield a clue in their daughter's disappearance nearly two months ago. But they say the agency won't release the records to them or the Lawrence Police Department because of concerns the disclosure would violate a far-reaching federal privacy law that took effect last spring.

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996, commonly known as HIPAA, shields most medical records from public view and imposes fines against agencies that wrongly release information.

But Smith's parents say the law could be harming their daughter instead of protecting her, and they question why Bert Nash won't make an exception in what might be a matter of life and death.

"That's the thing that just gnaws at me more than anything, to think that the one client that needs help most is the one they're turning their back on," said Marilyn Anderson, Smith's mother. "I think this HIPAA has gotten people so scared and so confused about what can and can't be done."

Smith, a server at the Bella Lounge, lived with her mother and stepfather, Gary Anderson, in the 2000 block of Quail Creek Drive. She was last seen watching television at home the night of Jan. 26, a few days after celebrating her 38th birthday.

Her parents still have the balloons from the party. Marilyn Anderson said she didn't want to throw them away because they were still inflated.

The morning of Jan. 27, Smith was gone, along with the family's van and her cell phone. On her dresser, she left belongings that still sit there today: her purse, a stack of bills, her asthma inhaler, a pair of cat-eye glasses her mother bought her as a gag birthday gift.

Smith, who had taken antidepressants in the past, also left a note that alluded to medication, her mother said.

Marilyn Anderson came home from work midmorning on the 27th to see if her daughter had returned. She didn't find her, but did find a message on the answering machine from a therapist Smith had been seeing at Bert Nash.

The message said simply that the therapist had received Smith's voice-mail message and was calling her back. What Smith's parents have been trying to find out for weeks is where their daughter was when she placed that call.

"That's been the missing link," Gary Anderson said.

The Andersons learned from talking with Smith's therapist that in the voice mail, Smith said she'd called Headquarters Counseling Center but couldn't get an answer she needed.

The Andersons pulled all their home and cell phone records and learned the call to Bert Nash didn't come from Smith's cell phone or from their home phone. They turned to Bert Nash and asked the agency to release a list of incoming calls from the days before Smith's disappearance.

That list, the Andersons said, could be narrowed by eliminating clients' known phone numbers, then sifting through the ones left over.

At times, it seemed Bert Nash would accommodate them, the Andersons said. But earlier this month, the door slammed shut.

"We've been told through this whole process it's because of HIPAA," Marilyn Anderson said.

Scott McMichael, a Bert Nash spokesman, declined to discuss in detail the extent to which the HIPAA law was affecting Smith's case. He would say only that the agency was cooperating with authorities as much as possible while still respecting patient confidentiality.

"I don't think they're being overly cautious," said Pete Curran, an attorney who represents Bert Nash. "I think that they're interpreting what they're required to do and attempting to follow that as best they can."

Curran also said he didn't think the agency would have acted any differently pre-HIPAA.

The Lawrence Police Department has a detective assigned to the case, but one problem is that, if police knew they were investigating a crime, they'd have more power to obtain documents such as medical records by court order.

"Being a missing person is not against the law, therefore there's no current open criminal case," said Sgt. Mike Pattrick, a police spokesman.

Pattrick declined to discuss any more details of how HIPAA relates to Smith's case but said in general that there were instances when the law made it harder for police to get information. Before HIPAA, for example, police used to be able to find out from hospitals if certain types of patients had come in -- say, a driver suspected to have been injured during a hit-and-run accident.

Now, hospitals are not required to notify police about patients in the emergency room unless the person has been shot or stabbed with a sharp instrument, Pattrick said.

HIPAA spells out certain pieces of information health-care providers can give to police who are trying to find a missing person, material witness, fugitive or crime suspect. It says the request must be initiated by law enforcement, not the health-care provider, and is limited to basic information such as dates of treatment, blood type and date of birth.

The part of the law that addresses missing people does not say anything about phone records.

"I understand very well about privacy, but I think there has to be an exception," Marilyn Anderson said. "After eight weeks, it's probably hopeless. We still don't know: Did she leave here, or did somebody get her?"

The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 was passed to keep patients' private health information out of the hands of those who don't need to see it.

But because of concern over penalties and misunderstanding of the law, a new University of Michigan study found, the flow of many kinds of information has been hindered since the law took effect last April. Among them:

 Participation in medical "outcome" studies, considered critical to evaluating patient care, has plummeted to 38.5 percent from 96.1 percent.

 Law enforcers' and investigators' ability to work a case has been hindered when they can't get information about, say, a violent-crime victim's injuries.

 Clergy members have a harder time learning a parishioner has been hospitalized, especially in an emergency.

 For hospitals and health care administrators, the process has cost a lot of labor and paperwork, as well as retrofitting computer systems to incorporate new codes for billing purposes.

[Denise]

Article from 3/04

Missing Woman's Family Says HIPAA Rules Blocking Search

LAWRENCE, Kan. -- A Lawrence couple searching for their missing daughter says the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act is blocking them from important information that could help them find their daughter, KMBC's Emily Aylward reported.

HIPAA is the law that keeps patients' medical records private. The bill was introduced in 1996, but wasn't strictly enforced until 2003.

Marilyn Anderson and her husband have been searching for their 38-year-old daughter since she disappeared nine weeks ago. Leslie Smith was last seen at the Lawrence house she shared with her mother and stepfather.

"She didn't take anything. Her purse, her ID; she took nothing with her," Anderson said.

Smith had been seeing a counselor at the Bert Nash Community Mental Health Center at the time of her disappearance.

"We know the last call she made was to her therapist at the Bert Nash Center, and all we wanted was for them to tell us what number she called from and at what time," Anderson said.

But the health center said it cannot legally provide that information. President Richard Johnson said HIPPA guidelines are inflexible.

"The law is the law. This is not a case about the rules -- the law is the law," he said.

Anderson thinks her missing daughter should be an exception, but Johnson said that's not possible. Bert Nash officials said they have tried calling the phone number themselves, but turned up nothing.

Smith was last seen driving a brown 1990 Plymouth Voyager minivan with a missing driver's side mirror.

[Denise]

Article from 3/04

Family, police seek clues in missing person case

J-W Staff Reports

Family members of a missing Lawrence woman are asking for the public's help finding her.

Lesley Smith, 38, was last seen the night of Jan. 26 at the home she shares with her parents in the 2000 block of Quail Creek Drive. The next morning, she was gone along with the family's brown 2000 Plymouth Voyager van.

She left behind her purse and its contents, including her asthma inhaler. She also left a note that said "I love you so much" and alluded to medication.

She'd taken antidepressants in the past, but family members say they're not convinced that played a role in her disappearance. They fear she might have been injured or abducted.

On Friday, a Kansas Highway Patrol helicopter spent three hours looking for the van without success. The Lawrence Police Department has two detectives assigned to the case.

People with information about Smith are asked to call the Police Department at 830-7430.

[Denise]

www.ljworld.com/section/c...ory/160601

Police find difficulties in missing adult cases

By Eric Weslander, Journal-World

Sunday, February 8, 2004

The disappearance of a 38-year-old Lawrence woman nearly two weeks ago reveals the sorts of difficulties police and families often encounter when adults go missing.

Lesley Smith's family members say they're frustrated because they fear people will jump to the conclusion that, because Smith is an adult, she must have gone somewhere willingly.

And police say absent witnesses or a compelling piece of evidence that a missing adult is in immediate danger, there's only so much they can do.

"Usually we go with the family's instincts or the loved one's instincts when they say this is totally out of character," said Lt. Dan Affalter, who supervises detectives at the Lawrence Police Department. "We take that very seriously, but the question is, if they're clueless and they know the person, where do we go?"

So far this year, four other adults have been reported missing to the Lawrence Police Department, Affalter said. One was found the same day, one was found three days later, and one turned up the next day in the Johnson County Jail, Affalter said.

Another, 22-year-old Hamidah Nagama of Lee's Summit, Mo., was reported missing Jan. 22 after she failed to enroll for Kansas University courses. As far as Lawrence and KU police know, she's still missing.

Often, the reasons someone is missing are simple -- and don't involve foul play.

Some missing adults meet a new person who occupies all of their time, Affalter said. People with substance-abuse problems might check themselves into confidential treatment programs or go on a binge. Other people simply feel the urgent need to take a road trip, he said.

"An awful lot of our missing-person cases shake out to be folks that are just not communicating with their loved ones," Affalter said.

Marilyn and Gary Anderson, Lawrence, hold a picture of their missing daughter, Lesley Smith, 38, who has been missing since Jan. 27. Police don't know how much danger she might be in.

Smith works as a server at the Bella Lounge, 925 Iowa, and lives with her parents in the 2000 block of Quail Creek Drive. She was last seen watching television at home about 10:30 p.m. Jan. 26.

In the morning, she was gone, along with the family's 1990 Plymouth Voyager Van.

She left many of her belongings she would need to survive on the road: her purse, driver's license, credit cards and bank cards. She took a cell phone, but its voice-mail in-box is now full of unanswered messages from her worried relatives.

Smith also left a cryptic note that alluded to medication and said "I love you so much." She had taken antidepressants in the past, but family members say they're not convinced that had anything to do with why she's gone.

"We've called everywhere -- contacted all of her friends in-state and out-of-state," said Smith's mother, Marilyn Anderson. "We have no idea."

Employees at the Bella Lounge are equally dumbfounded.

"We're all just very surprised and definitely didn't anticipate anything like that ever happening," co-worker Amber Nickel said.

On Jan. 30, the Kansas Highway Patrol spent three hours searching Douglas County by helicopter for Smith's van. Because the van hasn't been found, and because Smith left behind so many belongings, her family members fear she's in danger. They've called wrecker companies and distributed her photo to UPS drivers.

Anderson says she hopes conventional wisdom won't cause police to pursue her daughter's case more aggressively.

"People just assume that it is their free will: they're gone, so they chose to go," Anderson said. "That may not necessarily be the case."

The department has detectives assigned to both Smith's and Nagama's cases, and both women's names have been entered into a nationwide police database.

Anyone with information about their whereabouts can call the department's detectives at 830-7430.

[LoriDavis]

http://www.lawrencepolice.org/Press/040206_missing_person_poster.pdf

Lawrence Police Department profile for Leslie Smith