Father of Ali Kemp continues to bring justice to victims across the nation

I was at FBI headquarters the other day, for an awards program honoring people from with good ideas from Kansas City and across the country. The FBI director honored Scott LaMaster of Kansas City for his “Taking it to the Streets” initiative delivering food and water to first responders, and to the hungry.

At the awards ceremony, seating was random. On my right was Sharon Mentkowski from the FBI office in Buffalo, New York. When Sharon found out I work for the outdoor advertising association, she said her office used billboards to publicize a cold case of murder and robbery in upstate New York.

Immediately, I thought of Roger Kemp in Leawood, Kansas. After all these years, Roger Kemp’s good idea is working, nationwide and beyond.

In 2004, he pushed police and the billboard industry to put information about wanted criminals on billboards — a then-new tactic that helped locate the man who was later convicted of killing Roger’s daughter, Ali, who was 19.

Repetition on billboards of the message, “Call if you know something,” combined with the offer of anonymity, produces solid tips.

In the early days, when police experimented with donated wanted” billboards, Roger was impatient: Why was it taking so long for billboards everywhere to help police find fugitives?

Now, his idea is a standard tool for law enforcement from Buffalo to Baton Rouge.

Webster, New York, like Leawood, is a small town. In 2003, an armed imposter wearing an FBI jacket shot two people while robbing a Webster Xerox credit union, killing a longtime employee.

The case went cold for years. More than a decade later, the authorities launched a new billboard publicity campaign in upstate New York, asking help from the public and featuring enhanced photos of a suspect.

Police were able to make an arrest, and they gave credit to a solid tip from a citizen and a DNA match.

In 2007, the FBI started putting fugitives on high-tech digital electronic billboards at the suggestion of two women in Philadelphia (an FBI agent and a billboard employee). Today, the FBI has access to more than 6,000 digital billboards nationwide.

Fifty-seven hard-to-find FBI fugitives have been apprehended as a direct result of publicity on digital billboards, according to the bureau’s strict accounting methods.

In Las Vegas, after the mass shooting on Oct. 1, 2017, the FBI and local police turned to digital billboards to seek information from the public about the shooter. More than 4,000 tips poured in.

This April, when LaMaster got his special award at FBI headquarters, he was joined by Adam Barthelmess of Clear Channel Outdoor-Las Vegas. The FBI honored Barthelmess for generating information about important cases like the mass shootings, helping locate missing persons and fugitives, and fighting human trafficking.

Years ago, I recall sobering advice from John Walsh, who founded “America’s Most Wanted” after he lost his son Adam to crime. Walsh objects to the word “closure,” because parents who lose children to crime do not get to close the chapter of their loss forever.

Sadly, I must presume Walsh is correct. But while closure is elusive, Roger Kemp deserves credit and comfort because the sun does not set on his idea to use billboards for public safety. For Roger and the rest of us, that idea means those who violate our safety and well-being are less likely to hide from justice.

Thank you, Roger Kemp.

This story was originally published June 19, 2018 at 8:31 PM with the headline "Father of Ali Kemp continues to bring justice to victims across the nation."