A multi‑agency sweep on Oʻahu last weekend located and recovered 10 missing youths, state officials said Thursday. The targeted effort focused on foster and other at‑risk teens and follows years of similar recoveries across the islands. Authorities said the recovered young people are receiving trauma‑informed services while criminal investigations continue.
According to the Attorney General’s office and the Department of Human Services, several arrests were made during Operation Shine the Light, though officials did not disclose the number of arrests or the charges. The operation included federal partners such as the U.S. Marshals Service, the FBI and the U.S. Secret Service, along with the Honolulu Police Department and local service providers, and DHS Director Ryan Yamane said the effort ‘underscores the power of collaboration among federal, state, county, and community partners’ according to Spectrum News.
How the operation began
Operation Shine the Light began in 2020 as an initiative of the Attorney General’s Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force and the Missing Child Center‑Hawaii to locate endangered foster youth and other at‑risk runaways according to KITV. That early work has been cited nationally as an example of coordinated recoveries and interagency partnerships by the U.S. Department of Justice in coverage of missing‑children efforts.
The scale of the problem
National data show the scope: the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children assisted with roughly 29,568 reports of missing children in 2024, and estimates about one in seven of those cases may have involved child sex trafficking. Those figures help explain why targeted recovery operations continue to be a priority for state and federal partners.
Legal context
Federal law requires child‑welfare agencies to notify law enforcement and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children within 24 hours when a child in their care goes missing, and directs states to screen missing foster youth for trafficking — rules that shape how agencies respond to recoveries and investigations. Those reporting and screening requirements are part of the framework child‑welfare and law enforcement agencies use when coordinating operations and follow‑up services…