Montgomery County police outline new 'purple alert' and tighten missing-person response procedures

Assistant Chief Nicholas Oggs told the council that Montgomery County Police has strengthened its missing-person response and is coordinating with state partners to use recently created statewide alerts. "Montgomery County Police is committed, to helping those that are vulnerable as well as those that go missing in our county," Oggs said, noting partnerships with federal, state and local agencies and thanking staff who prepared the briefing packet.

Oggs walked the committee through the range of alert systems now available to investigators — Amber for abducted children, Silver for people with cognitive disorders, Blue for officer-involved incidents and the Purple Alert, which went into effect Oct. 1. He said Maryland State Police is still drafting implementation criteria for Purple Alerts and that MCPD will coordinate with MSP when an incident fits state law: "When the purple alert, when we do have an incident in Montgomery County, we will use this system to coordinate with Maryland State Police so they can disseminate information even further beyond our audience that we have here, locally," Oggs said.

The department also described local steps: adding clarifying, behavior-focused questions to the search-urgency evaluation form and changing the scoring so any total under 15 triggers an urgent response. MCPD said it has added documentation fields for caregivers and updated a social-media consent form (Form 592) to make clear what the department posts and the limits on removing widely disseminated photos. The changes are intended to accelerate search launches and broaden distribution channels — including Alert Montgomery templates managed by emergency management.