A child went missing in 1999, and his parents say they feel "very guilty" they didn't report him missing sooner. You know, sooner than the other day . . . ten years after the tween boy went missing.
Well, you know, feel guilty, act guilty . . . At the very least, these people must be guilty of being bad parents.
Adam Herrman disappeared from his adoptive parents, Doug and Valerie Herrman's trailer park in the town of Towanda, Kansas, in 1999. A foster child placed in the the Herrmans' care when he was two, Adam (born Irvin Groeninger III) was adopted by them. By the time he was eleven or twelve (somehow, police haven't been able to pin down an exact age - making me wonder if there's an exact day he was last seen), the Herrmans say he was running away frequently.
But when he up and disappeared again, they apparently decided he was with his biological parents . . . or homeless.
And still, they didn't report him missing.
According to a CNN report, a "person" made a report to the Sedgwick County Exploited and Missing Children's Unit that they were concerned about Adam Herrman. Police have since executed a search warrant at the family home, taking into possession their computer. They have gotten an answer, they said, to one of reporters' main questions . . . but they won't reveal which one.
Apparently it's not "what happened to Adam Herrman," because police said they don't know whether he's alive or dead. The Herrmans are not under arrest at this point, but their lawyer has said they "feel very guilty" and "rue" the fact that they didn't report him missing.
Of course, I can't help thinking of another missing Adam. Adam Walsh's parents went running to the cops because they loved their son and wanted them back, and their son is forever memorialized in the "Code Adam" alert for a missing child. Why wouldn't a set of parents (even those frustrated by a troubled runaway child) put out their own Code Adam for their Adam?
Usually, I try to stay away from the words "adoptive parents" because
once an adoption is final, the adopting parents are simply parents in
my book. But two people who let their pre-teen son go missing without
reporting it to police? I'm not sure I can call them parents.
Image: CNN
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