It has been one month since Phylicia Barnes went missing. You remember Barnes? She’s the honor student from Monroe with a gorgeous smile and brilliant mind who disappeared while visiting her stepsister in Baltimore.
It has been a month since her mother last saw her — a mother who is clearly heartbroken, yet refuses to give up hope that she will see her child alive again. Barnes reportedly left her sister’s North Baltimore apartment to get something to eat and hasn’t been seen or heard from since. Baltimore police say that they have searched every inch of the city and state but have found no traces of Barnes. Federal authorities were called in on the case. A $25,000 reward was announced in an effort to motivate someone to come forward with information. Barnes’ school held a vigil, with students wearing her favorite color, purple. Union Academy held a fundraiser and raised money to help with the search. Each day that passes lessens the chance that this child will be found alive. Each day that passes makes me wonder how a teen can disappear into thin air without anyone seeing her in a city like Baltimore.
Some people have pondered why she was out by herself in Baltimore. I’m intimately familiar with the city, and I’ve got to say that Baltimore’s reputation is far worse than its reality. Northwest Baltimore is a pretty nice part of town with strong Jewish and African-American communities. It is made up of tight-knit neighborhoods that some refer to as “suburban living” within city limits. In fact, Baltimore is a city where people are always out and about, even in bad weather. A teenager walking alone or among friends is not unusual in this city (or any East Coast city for that matter). Many people walk and take public transportation in Baltimore, particularly within the city limits, which is why it is so suspect that no one saw Barnes.
For decades, critics and communities of color have been kicking and screaming about the lack of coverage that black women and children receive when they disappear, notwithstanding the Atlanta child murders. This has not been the case with Barnes, whose case made the national news pretty quickly. It was heavily and immediately covered in the Charlotte press and Baltimore press. Billboards went up along the I-95 corridor, while news of Barnes’ disappearance spread like wildfire. Even Nancy Grace dedicated time on her show on HLN to cover Barnes’ case — and still nothing.
It saddens me to think that a $25,000 reward had to be trotted out in order to motivate people to talk about what happened to Barnes. What happened to protecting our children? If children are truly our greatest resource, why do we allow people to get away with harming them? Who would sit on information about the disappearance of a child; and how do they sleep at night knowing that a mother is wondering where her child is and what might have happened to her?
People want to place blame, but the fact is that you should be able to leave your house to get something to eat and come home unharmed. We are living in a society where violence is the norm, even here in Charlotte. The Center for Missing and Exploited Children lists 57 children from North Carolina as missing. Emilar St. Fleur, Benjamin Sanchez, Martin Gabriel Ramirez Garay, Viridiano Osorio and EL-Jahid Forever Allah are from Charlotte and surrounding areas. Asha Degree’s family has been waiting for her to come home for almost 11 years.
My point is that you can try as hard as you can to protect your children, but sometimes bad things happen anyway. It seems that something bad has happened to Phylicia Barnes, but no one is willing to step up and tell the truth about this young girl, with a brilliant future, who has somehow disappeared. What does that say about us as a community and as a society — when not only are we willing to inflict pain on children and their families, but unwilling to help find a child when someone knows what has happened to her?
Hopefully in the coming days, someone with a conscience or a need for money — or both — will come forward and help solve the mysterious disappearance of a dynamic young girl.
This article appears in Feb 1-7, 2011.
