JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 The family of 72-year-old Margaret Hanley, who went missing from her Westside Jacksonville home, is speaking out after her body was found in Hinesville, Georgia. They say the search for her could have been handled more quickly.<\/p>\n
Hanley was last seen by her family on February 7th. Her disappearance was reported to the Jacksonville Sheriff\u2019s Office on February 11th. While detectives investigated, her car was spotted by a Flock camera on February 8th in Georgia, and a \u201cbe on the lookout\u201d alert was sent to Liberty County and the state of Georgia.<\/p>\n
>>> STREAM ACTION NEWS JAX LIVE <<<<\/a><\/p>\n Suspicious bank activity led Hanley\u2019s children to suspect she may have been the victim of a scam. Transactions continued after she was last seen, including purchases in Gainesville and Starke, Florida. Despite this, a Silver Alert was not issued by JSO because her last known location was believed to be outside their jurisdiction.<\/p>\n Hanley\u2019s missing persons alert was not posted on JSO social media until February 19th, more than a week after her disappearance. The sheriff\u2019s office explained that the delay was due to jurisdiction concerns, but the alert was eventually shared to encourage tips and information.<\/p>\n Hanley\u2019s remains were recovered on February 21st in Liberty County, Georgia, less than 10 minutes from where her car had been last seen. Her son, Jomo Thompson, says he wants to use what happened to his mother to raise awareness about scams targeting the elderly and the timing of missing persons alerts.<\/p>\n [DOWNLOAD: Free Action News Jax app for alerts as news breaks<\/a>]<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re heartbroken and at a loss, but we are grateful we were able to find my mom,\u201d Thompson said. \u201cNot knowing what happened, especially during that week and a half, you run the gamut of emotions from hopeful to fearful.\u201d<\/p>\n Thompson added that he felt the case wasn\u2019t treated as a priority until he appeared on the Nancy Grace show, which brought national attention to his mother\u2019s disappearance. \u201cFor the average person without that exposure, you\u2019re at the mercy of the police department, and a family will exhaust all resources.\u201d<\/p>\n While he recognizes that law enforcement handles many cases, Thompson said he wishes the search for his mother had been more urgent. He also emphasized that the scammers responsible should be held accountable.<\/p>\n [SIGN UP: Action News Jax Daily Headlines Newsletter<\/a>] <\/p>\n \u201cMy mom\u2019s a baby boomer. There\u2019s a large population of older people who are being preyed on, and more needs to be done,\u201d Thompson said. \u201cPeople who prey on the elderly or children are the worst, and it needs to be stopped. A lot more needs to be done to help other people in my situation so they have a better outcome than we did.\u201d<\/p>\n Thompson said he hopes his family\u2019s experience will improve procedures for missing persons alerts. \u201cI shouldn\u2019t have to rely on my friends. You turn to law enforcement and want them to pull out all the stops. This information should have been disseminated earlier.\u201d<\/p>\n He added, \u201cI just wanted to see my mom one last time. I won\u2019t be able to do that, and it\u2019s hard. But I take some solace in the fact that we\u2019ll be able to lay her to rest and say our goodbyes. There\u2019s just so much more I want to know.\u201d<\/p>\n Click here<\/a> to download the free Action News Jax news and weather apps, click here<\/a> to download the Action News Jax Now app for your smart TV and click here<\/a> to stream Action News Jax live.<\/p>\n Action News Jax Top Stories<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Fla. \u2014 The family of 72-year-old Margaret Hanley, who went missing from her Westside Jacksonville home, is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":169622,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[41284,80780,18583,1853,78119,116,118,117,6458,75727,1872,79433,634,3499,75725,80781],"class_list":{"0":"post-169621","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-_georgia","9":"tag-action_jacktasia_mayfield","10":"tag-deja_mayfield","11":"tag-georgia","12":"tag-hanley","13":"tag-jacksonville","14":"tag-jacksonville-headlines","15":"tag-jacksonville-news","16":"tag-jacksonville_sheriffs_office","17":"tag-jomo_thompson","18":"tag-jso","19":"tag-liberty_county","20":"tag-local","21":"tag-margaret","22":"tag-margaret_hanley","23":"tag-nancy_grace"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169621","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=169621"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/169621\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/169622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=169621"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=169621"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=169621"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}