When is someone considered a "missing person"?

An adult who has no physical or mental health issues is free to pick up and move without ever telling anyone where they are going. So it's not a matter of time as much as it's a matter of risk. Without obvious signs of danger to the female, no one is going to investigate much. There would have to be signs of struggle, or some indication that she wasn't leaving under her own free will, or that she was intending to harm herself or others.

The 19-yo could be considered a danger to the teen, assuming he's underage, since she's an adult, assuming he's much younger than she is. But if he's 17 or so, many cops (probably more so of male cops) are going to generally blow off the idea that the teen boy is at risk. Make him below the age of consent, and things might get more interesting. But unless she's a teacher or has some other similar sort of control over him, there's not going to be as much of a risk in the eyes of law enforcement as there might be with the genders reversed.

What Bob said. Nothing will be done in the scenario you describe. Say what you need to happen and we can give better advice.

stardustx said:

In my story, a nineteen-year-old girl disappears during the night and is discovered missing the next morning. She left behind a note saying that she left with a teenage boy whom her friend, an adult woman, has reason to believe is dangerous. It takes place in South Boston.

I thought someone had to be missing for twenty-four hours before the police would consider them a missing person. But recently I heard that that's not always true.

So how long does someone have to be missing in order to be considered a missing person by the authorities?

Thank you.

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The girl you describe wouldn't be considered a missing person at all. She left a note saying she was leaving. She's an adult. There'd need to be a lot, lot more - in terms of the guy being known to be dangerous, the girl known to not be in her right mind or something similar - to get the cops involved, and even then it's iffy.

There are different rules in different jurisdictions, and very likely some LE agency regulations that further conform within the legal parameters of those (statutory/codified) rules. For example: assuming an adult and no signs of foul play (probable cause), some agencies must wait 24-48 hours before responding to a complainant wishing to report someone as a missing person. Once the report is filed, the circumstances of the case will dictate what resources (manpower), if any, can be spared/assigned to commence an investigation. Sometimes the filing of the report is as far as it goes.

As ironmike notes, the general question depends - a vulnerable adult l(someone with severe autism, or dementia, or something), a child, someone known to be in danger (someone with restraining orders out on an ex, who had complained to friends the ex had been calling or lurking, etc.), will generally trigger an immediate response. A regular adult who just doesn't show up, it depends on circumstance. Someone who left a note saying they were going off with someone, nuttin.

Why is there reason to believe the boy is dangerous? And is the older woman a relative or guardian?

T Robinson said:

What Bob said. Nothing will be done in the scenario you describe. Say what you need to happen and we can give better advice.

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This. There are plenty of reasons to get police involved if you need them, tell us what you need and we can help.

Jeff

stardustx said:

In my story, a nineteen-year-old girl disappears during the night and is discovered missing the next morning. She left behind a note saying that she left with a teenage boy whom her friend, an adult woman, has reason to believe is dangerous. It takes place in South Boston.

I thought someone had to be missing for twenty-four hours before the police would consider them a missing person. But recently I heard that that's not always true.

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It is almost never true. I don't think I've ever heard of a PD that actually has such a rule. Most major agencies will specifically mention this on their websites, since it's a potentially dangerous misconception. Boston PD does not (like the other public safety agencies in the city its internet presence is kind of sparse) but you do not ever have to wait any amount of time to report someone missing to them, regardless of who it is. Like the others have said, neither age nor time elapsed determines whether the police will do anything other than take a report but danger. If the missing person is a competent adult and there is no sign of foul play, they won't do anything else. But if there is reason to believe the person is in danger, they will get on it right away even if it's a healthy adult who's only been gone for 20 minutes.