HUMBLE, Texas – The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children, Texas Center for the Missing and Clear Channel Outdoor Americas launched a new month-long effort across Houston to help generate leads in the case of Ali Lowitzer, who disappeared in April 2010.
Photos of Ali, who was 14 when she went missing, will be broadcast on CCOA digital billboards throughout the region. Her image will be displayed more than 1,200 times per day over the month.
"For six years we have been searching for her, and it hadn't gotten any easier," the girl's mother, Jo Ann Lowitzer, said.
Ali last seen getting off the school bus before leaving home and walking to work. Authorities said she never made it to her job.
The teen's disappearance sparked a nationwide search and countless leads for investigators. The most shocking was a tip that Ali had been working in Columbus, Ohio, as a prostitute. It turned out the tip was wrong.
It isn't the first time searches have used a billboard to help find Ali. Lowitzer hopes this time it will garner tips that work and bring her daughter home.
"I wish this billboard could stay up permanently," Lowitzer said. "It's bigger than any storefront in town. If we had digital billboards for each of the missing people it could run for 24 hours. It's a sad fact."