SUFFOLK, Va. — Alexander Young was only four years old when his mother, Janice Laneau Wright, disappeared from a Suffolk neighborhood in the fall of 1993. Nearly 30 years later, news coverage of Wright’s mysterious and troubling disappearance has not gone beyond a few stories in Hampton Roads.
“What about my mom? She was somebody too,” said Young, the youngest of Wright’s four children. “I wouldn't want this to happen to anybody else, where their loved one [goes] missing, and you hear nothing about it.”
Watch: Investigation into racial disparities in missing person news coverage
According to the study “Missing White Woman Syndrome: An Empirical Analysis of Race and Gender Disparities in Online News Coverage of Missing Persons,” Black people were “significantly underrepresented in the population of missing persons who received coverage,” even though missing people of color make up nearly 40 percent of all missing persons cases. The analysis also found white women were overrepresented in news coverage, accounting for more than half of missing persons coverage when they make up 30 percent of missing persons cases.
Additionally, a News 3 Investigates analysis of missing persons cases from the National Crime Information Center revealed while Black women and girls make up roughly seven percent of the U.S. population, they account for nearly 36 percent of all missing females in America.
“If Black people go missing at double their occurrence in the actual population, which happens to be the case, there should be double the stories. But in fact, it's the opposite,” said Kyle Pope, the editor-in-chief and publisher of the Columbia Journalism Review.
Watch: Police fail to submit images of some missing Virginia children to database
Last year, Pope and his colleagues launched their “Are You Press Worthy” initiative to call attention to the news coverage disparity in America. By inputting your age, race and location, the tool predicts how much news coverage a person would receive based off which cases have made headlines in the past.
“When you go missing, your case gets more or less coverage, and it correlates directly to race,” Pope said.
“Not one person can name a missing black or brown male or female or child that has garnered mainstream media,” said Derrica Wilson, the co-founder of the Black and Missing Foundation.
“She didn't get the coverage that I have seen others get, that wasn't of color,” said Linda Archie, the mother of Kathryn Bene Griffin, a Portsmouth woman reported missing 11 years ago. “Lord, did somebody put my daughter in the woods? Did the animals get to her? Where is she? What could have happened to her?”
What’s at the root of the disparity? The Pew Research Center’s analysis of newsrooms found 77 percent of newsroom employees are white. The Center for Policing Equity found local police departments nationwide don’t reflect the racial makeup of the communities they serve, with white officers making up nearly 70 percent of departments across the country.
After the intense media coverage of Gabby Petito’s disappearance in 2021, News 3 launched the “Have You Seen Me?” series to draw attention to lesser-known missing persons cases in Hampton Roads.
“Your station and your work is a good example of how people are looking at this differently and […] taking it more seriously,” said Pope. “That's what we're trying to do.”
“I am really grateful for what you guys are doing,” Young said. "My goal is national news coverage."
You can view missing persons cases highlighted in the “Have You Seen Me?” series, and learn more about Janice Wright and Kathryn Griffin's cases.
