You may be seeing more Amber Alerts on your phone soon. That's thanks to a new tool that lets police send over those alerts faster than ever before. As normally, Jaiswal reports, it's designed
to save lives. With the Athena alert, local law enforcement will be able to send a regional alert to your phone about a missing child without having to wait for confirmation of an abduction. Gs us an Ave. to quickly
get that information out to the public without
having to have all those other elements, satisd Smith County. Merchant
Larry Christian says those elements
include verifying if it was a kidnapping or abducn and if that child is in danger that often. It takes 24 hours for a missing child case to be validated and every second coun, Every second is so precious. Senator Tan Parker is one of the sponsors of the
Athena Alert bill. He says this bill was
prompted
by the death of seven-year old
Athena Strand in Wise County who was allegedly
kidnapped. Murdered by delivery driver, the Athena Alert helps the publc and law enforcement to act quic. When a person has gone
missing, they'll stand in the gap so
that when local law enforcement believes something
is legitimate, they they they just know withinn hour or two of a child
being abducted, they can immediately jump on it. If we can get that Athena Alert out within the first hour of the actual report, it's huge. I mean that's that's something that that could potentially save a lot of lives of children. The alert will go out
to 100 mile radius to where the actual
fence took place. It gives citizens the opportunio to see that this child is missi. It will give a description of te child. Senator Parker wants to emphasize that it won't take away from the Amber Alert. It is simply an additional toolr local law enforcement to utiliz. It's just a complementary piece of legislation that we think is in the best interest of of child welfare and child safety here in the state. Sergeant Christian says their first priority is keeping the public safe. And with this new tool implemend in September, it will help them better protect our community. I'm Nirali Jaiswal with CBS 19.