Texas governor authorizes AMBER Alert-style system for adults

There's a new way to notify the public in Texas about missing adults. Officials are talking about calling it the Kelley Alert, it would be similar to an AMBER or Silver Alert. 

The alert would potentially be named after D’Lisa Kelley.

She was a pregnant Dallas woman who was kidnapped and murdered in March 2014.

Kelley was found dead a week after she went missing, but her family knew something was wrong right away. “[D’Lisa] accidentally called her sister during the first day of her being missing… we could hear her screaming for her life” her mother Lasondra Kelley explained. 

Days later, the 24-year-old was found dead at an abandoned home in Dallas’ Oak Hill neighborhood. “They said she’d only been dead, maybe three days. So that’s four days that we could have possibly found her.” Lasondra said. 

D’Lisa’s family had contacted the police department. It took a couple of days for a warrant of contact to be issued, a couple more for a critical missing alert to go out. “When her family contacted the police department to ping her phone they wouldn’t ping it.” said Rep. Toni Rose (D - Dallas).

Her mother wishes things could have gone differently.

Now, thanks to her hard work, they will for other families.

Governor Greg Abbott signed a bill authorizing the new alert system. “We do know that had it been in place that there was a possibility that D’Lisa Kelley would still be with us today” said Rose. 

The Department of Public Safety will be in charge of issuing these alerts.

It will serve as an alert system for missing adults ages 18 - 64, whose cases meet certain criteria. Such as: them being in “imminent danger,” and likely not voluntarily missing. The alert system will only operate in Texas, but Lasondra says she plans to push the effort nationwide. 

“Well it makes [D’Lisa] live forever, she’s helping to save other lives.” she said.