Blaine-based trucking company Kam-Way Transportation, Inc. is working with Washington State Patrol (WSP) to display photos of Sofia Juarez, who went missing from Kennewick in 2003.
“It’s really humbling,” said Kam Sihota, CEO and founder of Kam-Way Transportation. “It aligns with us giving back to the community we serve.”
WSP’s Missing and Unidentified Persons Unit unveiled photos of Juarez on the Kam-Way Transportation trucks at the Kennewick police department on February 4, 18 years after her disappearance and a day before her 23rd birthday.
This isn’t the first time Kam-Way has helped WSP display photos of missing children. These new trucks are part of the Homeward Bound Trucks program that raises awareness to missing children, which Kam-Way started helping with in 2019.
“The opportunity was presented to us two years ago because it fits into our social initiative,” Kam Sihota said.
Since then, the company has featured four missing people – Teekah Lewis, Misty Copsey, Alyssa McLemore and now Juarez – on a total of eight trucks.
The Homeward Bound project began in 2005 between WSP and Gordon Trucking but took a hiatus in 2018 when the trooper who started the program died. A former Kam-Way employee helped restart the project in January 2019. Kam-Way human resource director Harneet Sihota now leads the program with WSP.
“We want to bring children home, where they belong,” said Carri Gordon, WSP missing Person Unit Program manager, during the unveiling. “We are going to continue that effort with Kam-Way Transportation and make sure none of these children are forgotten.”
The trucks display a photo of Juarez and what she could look like today, in addition to a phone number and website for people to report information. The trucks also has a dedication to late WSP trooper Renee Padgett, who started the program, and information to join Be The Match registry, which facilitates bone marrow
transplantations.
Kam-Way covers material costs and WSP selects whose photo is displayed on the trucks, Kam Sihota said.
Juarez went missing walking to the store, in an attempt to follow a family member.
The Kennewick police department’s missing case file for Juarez spans 20,000 pages, according to WSP.
Kam Sihota said WSP asked the company to have trucks with the faces of two more children.
“How many come up, we’ll do,” he said.
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