March for the Missing in London

Date: 1/31/2008
My 19 year old son, Luke Durbin went for a night out in Ipswich with friends on 11th May 2006, they became separated. Luke was last seen on CCTV at 4am on 12th May. There has been no positive sighting of Luke since. All we know is that he was trying to get home.

Over the last twenty months I have had a lot of contact with other families of missing loved ones, two mums in particular have helped me retain my sanity, Sandra Flintoft, mum of Craig Hetherington who has been missing since 2003 and the other mum, Val Nettles, whose son Damien has been missing since 1996. I am able to talk freely with them about my more sinister fears and they have made me feel normal in the most abnormal circumstances.

Through talking to other people with missing people in their lives, our feelings seemed to be echoed, there is very little support for the families left behind. There is only one National charity for ‘missing’ and the families left behind, Missing People. They helped enormously with publicity but they are limited in their resources in being able to offer coping strategies, counselling and a basic support group facility.

I have learnt to live my ‘parallel lives’, as all families of the missing have to but at times I have felt so desperate in not being able to deal with the overwhelming despair, I have called all number of organisations but I don’t fit their criteria. There is nothing conclusive to suggest Luke is dead or alive, so we as families and friends of missing loved ones are expected to just “get on with it”.

After many conversations albeit via email, Val Nettles and I decided something had to be done, for the families who have already lost someone and for the families who will sadly unbeknown to them, maybe in our nightmare world in the future! We are planning a march in London for families and friends of the missing and their supporters.

The aims of the march are;

to highlight all missing people in the UK and missing UK citizens that have gone missing overseas
to lobby the Government in either establishing a support group for families of the missing or giving restricted funding to a charity such as Missing People so they are able to estabish a support group for families of the missing
to lobby the Government to establish a designated Missing Persons Team within every police force in the UK, thus guaranteeing a uniformed service and support network to each family that reports a missing family member, regardless of the age, class or gender of the missing person

For anyone who maybe interested in joining families, friends and supporters of the March for the Missing, it is being held on Wednesday 12th March 2008, at 10am. Starting at 32 Gt. Cumberland Place, London.

If you are able to attend or would like more information please email themissing@hotmail.co.uk as we will have to go through official channels and contact the police with expected numbers so the march can be risk assessed. If you are unable to attend but feel you maybe able to support us in other ways, please, please email and let us know.

If you have a Faceboook account – which seems to be becoming very big with publicising missing and unlike MySpace it does not get spammed – look for March for the Missing

Best wishes

Val & Nicki
www.findluke.com
www.damiennettles.com
March for the Missing March 12, 2008 10 a.m.
32 Gt. Cumberland Place, London
Nr. Marble Arch
www.truecrimeblog.co.uk/2007/12/calling-all-families-of-missing-persons.html
Please take time to sign the petition below
http://www.thepetitionsite.com/takeaction/280079339