Defining and Counting Missing Children
There are seven categories of missing children as defined within the police authorities:
1. Stranger abduction: abduction by anyone other than by the subject's parent or guardian.
2. Parental abduction: abduction of a child by a parent or guardian.
3. Runaway children: children, 18 years and under whom run away from home or substitute home care.
4. Accident: the probable cause for the disappearance is an accident of some kind and the body has not been recovered.
5. Wandered off: when it is presumed the child has wandered away in a confused state.
6. Unknown: the child is missing and the police agency has no previous record of the child running away or wandering off before.
7. Other; the child has not returned to a detention home or institution housing young offenders .