During the week of June 23 - 27, 2008, the Massachusetts State Police hosted Child Abduction Response Team (C.A.R.T.) Training at the State Police Academy in New Braintree. The C.A.R.T. Training Program, provided by Fox Valley Technical College through funding provided by the Department of Justice, is designed for professionals from a variety of disciplines within a community that may be involved in the immediate response to a missing, endangered or abducted child incident. Statistics indicate that the first three hours of a child abduction are the most critical, as the vast majority of abducted children who are murdered are dead within three hours of the abduction. C.A.R.T. reduces the amount of time that is needed to locate resources and initiate the search for missing and abducted children.
Class participants included members of the Massachusetts State Police, Connecticut State Police, Maine State Police, New Hampshire State Police, Rhode Island State Police, a variety of Local Massachusetts Law Enforcement and Search and Rescue Agencies, the Department of Social Services, the Department of Education, MassHighway, and WBZ Radio.
The training included testimonials from families of abducted and murdered children, Team and Policy Development, Legal Issues, Investigative Strategies, Media Relations, and Resources available to C.A.R.T. from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. The final day of training included a practical exercise where teams pulled together all the elements of the training they had received to respond to a mock abduction incident. This exercise gave team members an idea of what to expect when they experience a C.A.R.T. activation once they return home.