Tough words from Harris County Sheriff as 'Safe Child' initiative begins

HOUSTON (KTRK) -- Harris County Sheriff Adrian Garcia, along with Crime Stoppers, is launching their "Safe Child" initiative today. It's a major effort to keep children safe from dangerous predators.

This is the sixth year that Crime Stoppers has done this and they say it is paying off, taking hundreds of dangerous child predators off the street.

Rick Garcia is a convicted child rapist. Mirshad Pineda, allegedly beat her own infant to death. They are just 2 of 1,600 fugitives charged with crimes against children who are at large in Harris County.

Eight-hundred-and-forty-seven of them are on the Crime Stoppers web site and 12 are up on billboards all over the area.

This is all part of the Safe Child Initiative. Every year during April, which is child abuse prevention Month, Crime Stoppers puts out information about dangerous felons who have harmed children.

To date, their campaign has led to the arrest of 195 fugitives wanted for sex crimes against children, and 127 who failed to register or violated the terms of their probation.

The Gulf Coast Regional Task Force is working with law enforcement officers from many agencies who will go out and arrest people based on the tips that come in. Harris County Sheriff Garcia has a warning for those people and for anyone harboring a fugitive.

"If we find out that you are out there, and you don't turn yourself in, get ready to have a great wakeup call by the members of my team," said Garcia at a press conference Monday. "We are going to smash your door down. We're going to grab you out of bed. We're going to put you in jail because we don't need predators out in the community."

There is a 5,000 award for information leading to an arrest in these cases. Click here to see if you recognize any of these these fugitives.

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crime stoppers, local, katie mccall

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