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Elizabeth Smart
Most Americans can remember where they were March 12, 2003 when the news broke that Elizabeth Smart had been recovered and was safely back with her family. Elizabeth’s captors had controlled her by threatening to kill her and her family if she tried to escape. Her abduction and recovery motivated parents, law enforcement, and leaders world-wide to focus on children’s safety, the vigilance of every day people in finding missing children, and the belief that there is always hope, we can never stop searching for each and every missing child.
Elizabeth recently finished serving an LDS mission in France following her dream to share with others what has given her strength. During this past year she triumphantly testified before her captor and the world about the very private nightmare she suffered for nine months and how she determined to survive and continue her life after tragedy. Elizabeth will finish at Brigham Young University studying music with an emphasis on harp performance in spring of 2012. Elizabeth has become an advocate for change related to child abduction and recovery programs and legislation. As well as being involved in the ”Elizabeth Smart Foundation." Elizabeth has helped promote The National AMBER Alert, The Adam Walsh Child Protection & Safety Act, and other safety legislation to help prevent abductions. Two years ago, Elizabeth worked with the U.S. Department of Justice and four other recovered young adults in creating a survivors guide, entitled “You’re Not Alone: The Journey From Abduction to Empowerment” to encourage children who have gone through similar experiences to not give up and know that there is life after tragic events.
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Alicia Kozakiewicz
“The Alicia Project,” though rooted in tragedy, has become a voice for exploited and missing children. In January of 2002, its namesake, Alicia Kozakiewicz, became the victim of an Internet luring and was abducted to another state where she was held captive. Following a miraculous rescue by the FBI, Alicia, still recovering from her ordeal, returned to school and was soon highly involved in both academic and extracurricular activities, graduating with high honors. During these years, she came to realize that other children need not suffer her traumatic experience, and so “The Alicia Project,” Internet safety and awareness education, was born.
Along with her parents, Mary and Charles, she has educated children, families, teachers, law enforcement and governmental and social agencies, and has been honored to address numerous conferences, forums and summits, lending her personal and unique insight of the subject. She has participated in Internet Safety films for the FBI, the Office of the PA Attorney General’s Operation Safe Surf, the PA Cyber School, the Pennsylvania Center for Safe Schools, Enough is Enough, and the A&E Biography Channel, among others, as well as being the subject of an award winning Internet Safety documentary for PBS, "Alicia’s Message: I’m Here To Save Your Life." Her story and mission have been featured on the Oprah Winfrey Show, as part of Internet Safety programs across the nation, and internationally in a number of publications including People and Cosmopolitan, in the hope of raising awareness. Collaborating with four other young survivors, Alicia co-authored an OJJDP publication, “You’re Not Alone: The Journey From Abduction to Empowerment,” a survival guide for returning abductees.
Additionally, recognizing the need for effective Internet Safety legislation, Alicia testified before Congress, and has lobbied successfully for the PROTECT Our Children Act of 2008 and Alicia’s Law, a state-by-state version of the same, which has become the mechanism to apply self-reliant dedicated funding – real dollars for real child rescue. Alicia’s Law has passed in Virginia and Texas and she has dedicated herself to seeing the initiative is passed in all fifty states.
Alicia has received both a 2009 Jefferson Award and the 2007 Courage Award from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in recognition of her efforts.
Having earned her B.A. in Psychology, Alicia is continuing her mission and hoping to one day earn the title of Special Agent, and joining the FBI taskforces that were instrumental in her rescue. “I’d like,” she says, “to ultimately become the person who rescues the child, and then helps to recover that child’s soul.”
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