{"id":52335,"date":"2025-11-19T06:05:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-19T06:05:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/52335\/"},"modified":"2025-11-19T06:05:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-19T06:05:08","slug":"floridas-operation-home-for-the-holidays-recovers-122-missing-children-leading-to-six-arrests","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/52335\/","title":{"rendered":"Florida’s ‘Operation Home for the Holidays’ recovers 122 missing children, leading to six arrests"},"content":{"rendered":"

A massive Florida law enforcement operation led to the recovery of over a hundred missing or endangered children across the state, according to authorities. <\/p>\n

The two-week statewide \u201cOperation Home for the Holidays\u201d led to the rescue of 122 children between the ages of 23 months and 17 years old, Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier\u00a0announced in a press conference on Monday \u2014 calling it one of the single largest operations of its kind in US history.<\/p>\n

\"AttorneyThe two-week statewide \u201cOperation Home for the Holidays\u201d led to the rescue of 122 children between the ages of 23 months and 17 years old. Office of the Attorney General<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is why we do the job. Here in Florida, everybody now knows protecting our kids, keeping them safe, preventing them from being extorted and in danger, that\u2019s what it\u2019s all about,\u201d Uthmeier told reporters.<\/p>\n

Various state and local authorities worked alongside US Marshals to locate the children, including 57 children in the\u00a0Tampa Bay\u00a0area, 14 in\u00a0Orlando, 22 in Jacksonville, and 29 in Fort Myers, Uthmeier said in a press release. <\/a><\/p>\n

The operation also led to rescues in nine other states, the AG added. The number of children rescued in those states is not immediately known.<\/p>\n

Many of the children experienced some form of abuse, neglect, exploitation, or exposure to criminal activity, authorities said.<\/p>\n

\"FloridaSix people were arrested over the course of the massive law enforcement effort. AP<\/p>\n

Six people were arrested over the course of the massive law enforcement effort, Uthmeier added.<\/p>\n

Officials did not release the identities of those individuals during the media briefing, but some have been charged with felonies, including crimes involving sexual battery on a child and custodial interference.<\/p>\n

\u201cMany of these kids have been victimized in unspeakable ways. We will prosecute their abusers to the fullest extent of the law,\u201d Uthmeier said in a statement.<\/p>\n

Operation \u201cHome for the Holidays\u201d utilized real-time intelligence and field operations to locate the slew of missing children, officials said.<\/p>\n

Victim advocates and child welfare specialists also coordinated with law enforcement to give the children access to resources upon their rescue. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe United States Marshals Service is proud to stand with our partners across the state of Florida in pursuit of the safety and welfare of our children,\u201d\u00a0 United States Marshal for the Middle District of Florida Bill Berger said in a statement. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis operation was built based upon the wants and needs of our communities.\u00a0 We are honored to play a leading role in answering those calls,\u201d Berger said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A massive Florida law enforcement operation led to the recovery of over a hundred missing or endangered children…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52336,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[6041,28,30,29,32200,16514,4278],"class_list":{"0":"post-52335","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-florida","8":"tag-child-abuse","9":"tag-florida","10":"tag-florida-headlines","11":"tag-florida-news","12":"tag-missing-children","13":"tag-search-and-rescue","14":"tag-us-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52335","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=52335"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52335\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52336"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52335"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52335"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52335"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}