New partnership takes flight for missing kids

For 17 years, Howard Epstein, a retired rheumatologist in Cleveland, has volunteered with Mercy Medical Angels, flying patients in his single-engine plane to hospitals where they can get the medical care they need.

But after dropping off a patient in Maryland, the 73-year-old pilot was asked to take on a different kind of mission: fly to North Carolina to pick up a K-9 team from the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children (NCMEC) and transport them and their German shepherd, Onna, to Ohio to search for two children who’ve been missing for years.

For more than five decades, Mercy Medical Angels has helped patients in the mid-Atlantic area reach critical medical care they might otherwise be unable to access or afford. Now, the nonprofit is extending that spirit of service to help NCMEC find missing children and also help reunite families when children are recovered far from home.

“It’s absolutely incredible that two not-for-profit organizations can work together to make the world a better place,” said Epstein, who worked at the Cleveland Clinic for more than 30 years. “I would jump at the chance to help them again. I just felt so great after that flight.”

Onna checks out the view from Epstein’s plane enroute to Ohio.

NCMEC deploys Team Adam, primarily comprised of retired investigators, to assist law enforcement when children go missing. But getting them to remote locations or transporting search dogs and specialized equipment can present challenges. 

When new information was developed in two unrelated long-term missing cases in the Cleveland area, the U.S. Marshals Service requested help from NCMEC with land and water searches. Keshaun Williams, 15, went missing three years ago; Yvonne Regler, 17, has been missing for 49 years.

Lisa Briggs directs Onna to search water in 3-year-old missing case of 15-year-old Keshaun Williams.

Rich Leonard, who oversees Team Adam’s 148 consultants nationwide, deployed K-9 Team Lisa Briggs and Edwin Grant and Onna to take the inaugural flight.

“It’s a great partnership, and we’re thrilled to be able to work with these folks,” Leonard said. “It’s difficult to get airlines to let us bring dogs, and it’s a hassle going through TSA. Mercy Medical Angels can get us much closer to where we need to be.”

Briggs, who has helped with hundreds of searches, said flying commercially used to be fairly easy. But it’s gotten much harder for airlines to accommodate dogs, especially large ones like Onna, and delays have left them sitting on tarmacs and in airports, wasting precious time. 

Team Adam consultant Edwin Grant oversees search on land in case of 17-year-old Yvonne Regler.

Epstein picked up the team on Oct. 6 in his Beechcraft Bonanza in Asheville and whisked them off to Cleveland, where they hit the ground running. Briggs said she and Onna started searching a river for any signs of Keshaun, while Grant oversaw the search on land. After two days, the searches did not yield answers but will enable law enforcement to pursue other leads. 

Briggs said Mercy Medical Angels’ help will be especially valuable in active, critically missing child cases when time is paramount.

“It enables a deployment so much quicker,” said Briggs, who was flown home along with the rest of the team by a second volunteer pilot, Josh Marsh. “Those private planes can fly us into places where we can bypass large airports. It was a game changer for us.”

To learn more about Team Adam and other NCMEC resources, go to https://ncmec.org/ourwork/caseresources.