‘Bring him home’: Jacksonville remembers its missing adults

How long does it take to forget, when a loved one has gone missing?

Those who were on hand in the atrium of Jacksonville’s city hall on Friday morning can tell you.

The answer is indeterminate.

Grieving parents and loved ones were there for one of the more emotionally wrenching events on the city calendar – the Florida Missing Adults’ Day, hosted by the John Rowan Jr. Foundation and the Justice Coalition.

The slogan of the event – “missing, not forgotten” – is a great reminder.

Whether a person went missing in 2015, 2000, or 1982, the search continues.

There is no closure.

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Luckily for most who go missing, and for their families, the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office has a good clearance rate for adults that go missing.

In 2016, all but four of a total of 823 missing adults were found in Duval County, adding up to a 99.5 percent clearance rate.

Some cases, of course, are more difficult to clear than others – and a recent example of a case of a missing infant who became a missing adult before she was found illustrates the process.

Kamiyah Mobley, located in South Carolina’s Lowcountry recently, was abducted from a local hospital just after she was born.

Almost two decades later, Mobley was found.

The search was exhaustive.

Undersheriff Pat Ivey noted that the Jacksonville Sheriff’s Office had followed up on 2500 leads over the past 18 years.

“By the grace of God,” Ivey said, Mobley was reunited with her birth mother.

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Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry, focused on public safety throughout his time in office, spoke by way of issuing a proclamation.

“I can’t imagine what you are going through … have gone through,” Curry said, before giving yellow roses of remembrance to those still searching

Indeed, for those who have not been through the specific hell of waiting and hoping, of knowing part of one’s heart is gone and knowing there is no fix and scant likelihood of a resolution – much less a good one – it is hard to imagine.

The raw emotion of the event was unmistakable.

Never more evident was it than when John Rowan sang a song for his son who had disappeared 16 years prior, however.

The haunting refrain: “Bring him home, bring him home.”

The Irish tenor voice, with heartache piercing through the notes, echoing off of the cavernous walls of the city hall atrium.

John Rowan, Jr. was declared dead over a decade ago.

Yet his memory lives on. And so does hope, a quality every bit as ineffable and stubborn as faith itself.