Child Find’s founder finds her own child

Press, 30 August 1984, Page 15

Child Find’s founder finds her own child

NZPA-AP Kingston New York The founder of Child Find, Inc., one of the biggest and best known missing children’s organisations in the United States, has been reunited with her daughter, almost 10 years after the child disappeared. Gloria Yerkovich, of New Paltz, and her daughter, Joanna, almost 16, were reunited at the Ulster County Courthouse and then departed for several private days together, said a Child Find spokeswoman, Janette Demenkoff. The reunion came after more than a month of negotiations between a county district attorney, Michael Kavanaugh, and attorneys for Mrs Yerkovich and Joanna’s father, Franklin Pierce. Joanna allegedly was abducted on December 20, 1974, by Mr Pierce while on her first court-ordered overnight visit with her father. Where Joanna had been living for the last 10 years was not disclosed. Ms Demenkoff said the meeting was kept as quiet as possible.

Mrs Yerkovich spent more than $40,000 ($NZ80,000) of borrowed money searching for her daughter. Under terms of the agreement, no charge was filed against Mr Pierce and the prosecutor has a year to decide whether to press charges, according to Anthony Giambruno, a spokesman for Child Find. Mrs Yerkovich started Child Find in 1980 because of what she called the inability of available legal systems to act with sensitivity regarding reported cases of missing children. In October, 1983, Child Find was flooded with calls after the airing of the made-for-television movie, “Adam,” about a boy who . was kidnapped and killed, the end of the two-hour film, 55 photographs of missing children were shown, all of them children registered with Child Find. The programme was rebroadcast last April. To date, Child Find has played some part in the finding of more than 1000 missing children, according to Mr Giambruno.