The Ashanti Billie Story
Ashanti Markaila Billie was born May 13, 1998, and died September 29, 2017. Ashanti was a 19-year-old woman with a promising future, goals, and dreams. In August 2017, she was accepted to the Art Institute of Virginia in Virginia Beach to study the Culinary Arts. She obtained a job on the Joint Expeditionary Base Little Creek-Fort Story Navy Base as an Assistant Manager at a fast food establishment on the base. On September 18, 2017, Ashanti was scheduled for an early shift but never arrived. Two weeks later, authorities discovered her body in Charlotte, North Carolina—350 miles away.
The amount of time and distance traveled between Ashanti's abduction and the discovery of her body as well as her age causing her to fall outside the scope of other alert programs, resulted in questions about the lack of a state, regional, or nationwide missing persons alert system that focused on individuals over the age of 17. Named in her honor, the Ashanti Alert Act aims to solve this problem.
Ashanti is buried in Maryland Veterans Cemetery in Cheltenham, Maryland.
What Is the Ashanti Alert Act?
The Ashanti Alert Act of 2018 (Pub L. 115-401) was signed into law on December 31, 2018. The Act authorizes the U.S. Attorney General (AG) to establish a national communications network that leverages local elements (state, local, tribal, and territorial [SLTT] alert programs) to enable alerting capabilities for missing individuals who fall outside the scope of AMBER Alert and Silver Alert communication networks. The Act also authorizes the AG to designate an employee in the Office of Justice Programs (OJP) as the National Ashanti Alert Coordinator to provide guidance, support, and resources. The chart below summarizes the key elements of the Act as well as clarified what the Act does not address or require.
What Is the National Ashanti Alert Network?
The Network aims to help connect local missing adult alert programs and enable the sharing of alerts across state lines. The focus of the Network is to help:
- Establish missing adult alerting capabilities in all states, territories, and tribal areas.
- Enhance existing missing adult program capabilities.
- Implement capabilities that help missing adult programs facilitate the sharing of information when missing adults cross state, territory, or tribal boundaries.
The Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) was assigned to assist in establishing the National Ashanti Alert Network.