Rachael Marie Runyan.
The murder of Rachael Runyan is a currently unsolved child murder which occurred in Sunset, Utah, on August 26, 1982, in which a three-year-old girl named Rachael Marie Runyan was abducted from a playground and murdered by an unknown individual. Her body was found three weeks later in a creek bed in nearby Morgan County.
One of Utah's most notorious cold cases, Rachael's murder ultimately proved a catalyst to establish the Rachael Alert child abduction alert system, which would remain in place in the state of Utah until 2003, when the state adopted the national AMBER alert child abduction emergency alert system.
The abduction and murder of Rachael Runyan was a factor in the 1983 passage of the US Congressional Missing Children's Act, which mandatedan allocation of additional resources for the investigation of ongoing missing children cases.
In 2017, the Rachael Runyan Missing and Exploited Children's Day was signed into legislation in Utah. The purpose of the annual observance is to raise public awareness of missing and exploited children within the state; the annual awareness date is August 26, the date of Rachael's abduction. As of 2019, Runyan's abduction and murder remain unsolved.
In the late morning of August 26, 1982, Rachael Runyan and her five-year-old brother, Justin, asked their mother if they and their younger brother Nathan, aged 18 months, could briefly play in the playground of Doxey Elementary School. Although Elaine Runyan had never previously allowed her children to play unsupervised either outside the family home or in any location, as she had been in the process of preparing lunch for her children when Rachael and Justin made this request and the Doxey Elementary School playground was just 15 feet (4.6 m) from her home and well within eyesight of her kitchen window, she agreed to her children's request. Nonetheless, Elaine Runyan repeatedly looked through the kitchen window and conversed with her children as she prepared this meal.
When Elaine Runyan called her three children to lunch at approximately 12:55 p.m., only Nathan and Justin returned home, with Justin blurting to their mother that Rachael had been taken from the park by force moments prior by a young black man who had initially offered to buy her ice cream and bubble gum at a nearby supermarket. According to Justin, this man had approached them as they played in the sandpit, attempting to lure all three siblings into his car with an offer to puchase candy for the trio, and that when he, Nathan and Rachael had been close to the man's car, Rachael had informed the man she liked bubble gum-flavored ice cream, to which this individual claimed to have ice cream of this flavor in his car. When he (Justin) had warned Rachael not to accompany the man any further, she began to turn and walk away from the man, who in response simply picked Rachael off the ground and placed her over his shoulder before bundling her, screaming, into his car as Justin stood frozen in fear with 18-month-old-Nathan standing by his side.
Elaine rushed to the supermarket the kidnapper had mentioned, repeatedly asking staff and shoppers she encountered the question: "Have you seen a little blond girl? A 3-year-old with a black man?" although nobody she encountered had seen her child. Approximately 20 minutes after the disappearance of her daughter, Elaine reported Rachael's abduction to the Sunset Police Department.
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A Rachael Runyon gyilkosság. egy jelenleg megoldatlan gyermek gyilkosság bekövetkezett Sunset, Utah , augusztus 26-án, 1982-ben, ahol egy három éves Rachael Marie Runyan kislány nevűt elraboltak egy játszótéren és meggyilkoltak egy ismeretlen személy. A testét három héttel később egy patak ágyban találták a közeli Morgan megyében .
Az egyik Utah leghírhedtebb esete volt, Rachael meggyilkolása végül bizonyult katalizátornak arra, hogy meg alapitása legyen Rachael Alertnek ami gyermekrablási riasztórendszernek , amely a helyén marad, a Utah állam 2003-ig, amikor az állam elfogadta a nemzeti AMBER figyelmeztető gyermekrablás-vészhelyzeti riasztórendszert
Rachael Runyan elrablása és gyilkossága volt az USA Kongresszusi Hiányzó Gyermektörvényének 1983-as szakaszában , amely további erőforrások felosztását írta elő a folyamatban lévő eltűnt gyermekek esetének vizsgálatára.
2017-ben a Rachael Runyan hiányzó és kizsákmányolt gyermeknapját Utahban aláírták. Az éves megfigyelés célja az, hogy a nyilvánosság tudatosítsa a hiányzó és kizsákmányolt gyermekeket az államon belül; az éves tudatosság napja augusztus 26-a, Rachael elrablásának napja. 2019 -től a Runyan elrablása és gyilkossága megoldatlan maradt.