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This Heartbreaking Video Shows a Grief-Stricken Teen Ask 'Why' During D.C. Town Hall on Missing Black and Brown Girls

Black lawmakers have reached out to the FBI for help.

Recently, the news of missing Black and Brown girls in Washington, D.C., has devastated the nation. Many had questioned why media outlets and government officials have not spoken to the high number of unsolved missing persons cases in Washington. 

In the first three months of 2017, over 500 children have been reported missing in Washington. Several influential people in the media have increased the visibility of the story, specifically highlighting the fact that many of the missing children are girls of Black or Hispanic descent. 

  • During a town hall discussing the missing girls, one woman in tears repeatedly asked 'why' regarding the inequality in treatment of minorities

  • The video has many empathizing with the young woman and the high number of missing children in D.C.

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  • Black lawmakers have asked the FBI to help locate the missing girls

    In a letter sent on Tuesday, Black members of Congress asked Attorney General Jeff Sessions and FBI Director James Comey for resources to help locate the missing girls. According to the Associated Press, the District “logged 501 cases of missing juveniles, many of them Black or Latino, in the first three months of this year.”

    “Ten children of color went missing in our nation’s capital in a period of two weeks and at first garnered very little media attention,” read the letter, penned by Congressional Black Caucus chairman Cedric Richmond and Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton. “That’s deeply disturbing,”

    The DOJ and FBI was asked to “devote the resources necessary to determine whether these developments are an anomaly or whether they are indicative of an underlying trend that must be addressed.”

  • A map published by NBC shows the locations of where some of the missing teens were last seen

    The map published by NBC 4 shows many of the girls were last seen in similar areas around the Anacostia River. 

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