This bill amends RCW 68.50.320 and adds a new section to chapter 43.43 RCW to expand procedural duties when a person reported missing has not been located within 30 days or when investigators suspect criminal activity. It requires the investigating sheriff, police chief, coroner/medical examiner, or other law enforcement authority to file a missing person report with the Washington State Patrol (WSP) Missing and Unidentified Persons Unit, enter the case into NCIC via the WSP electronic database, initiate collection of nuclear and mitochondrial DNA from the missing person and family members with required consent forms, submit collected DNA to an appropriate laboratory as soon as possible, and record descriptive and dental data in the dedicated missing person databases. Jails must notify the agency of original jurisdiction if they learn via NCIC or similar systems that a person in custody or being released is the subject of a missing person report. The WSP unit must request written consent from family or next of kin to contact dentists, and dentists must provide diagnostic-quality dental records when presented with that consent or with a law enforcement statement that family consent could not be obtained. Law enforcement must report when a missing person is found. The added section requires the WSP Missing and Unidentified Persons Unit to establish and maintain a publicly available statewide missing persons website that posts, at minimum, a person’s name, physical description, photograph, and other protocol-specified information, and to allow broader public dissemination of a missing person’s information for at least 30 days. The WSP must, subject to availability of appropriated funds, regularly transmit website information to the national missing and unidentified persons system and establish an interface among local law enforcement, the statewide website, a toll-free 24-hour hotline, and national or other statewide missing persons systems. Local law enforcement must file official missing person reports and enter biographical information into the state missing persons computerized network without delay. This is primarily a procedural change: it creates new reporting, data-collection, data-sharing, and public-disclosure requirements, adds a public statewide missing persons website, and imposes duties on law enforcement, jails, the WSP unit, and dentists. The bill also repeals RCW 36.28A.110, 36.28A.112, and 36.28A.120. The extracted text does not show the exact new RCW subsection number, the adopted protocols that determine additional posted information, funding amounts or sources for transmissions to national systems, which laboratories are considered “appropriate,” or the content and effects of the repealed statutes.

If enacted, local law enforcement (sheriffs, police, coroners, medical examiners) will face more required steps for missing-person cases: they must file reports with the Washington State Patrol Missing and Unidentified Persons Unit when a person is still missing after 30 days or when criminal activity is suspected, collect DNA from the missing person and family and send it to a lab quickly, enter cases into NCIC and the state missing persons system without delay, and coordinate with jails that learn a detainee matches a missing-person report. Dentists will be required to provide diagnostic-quality dental records when presented with family consent or an authorized law enforcement statement, which will add administrative work and potential costs for copying and release. The Washington State Patrol will need to run a public statewide missing persons website, maintain files of descriptive and dental information, and set up interfaces with local agencies and a 24-hour hotline, which creates ongoing staffing and operational costs; routine sharing with the national missing persons system is expressly tied to available appropriated funding, so fuller national transmission may be delayed or limited. Key uncertainties remain about funding amounts and sources, what specific information protocols will require for public posting, which laboratories are considered “appropriate,” and how repealing the cited RCWs changes existing local duties.