While it’s wonderful that Jaycee Lee Dugard was found alive, after spending 18 years of her life as a prisoner of Phillip and Nancy Garrido, many are starting to question why on earth she wasn’t found sooner. Law enforcement missed multiple opportunities to find Dugard. In 2006, an anonymous caller phoned police and said that Garrido was “psychotic” and that they had heard children’s voices in the backyard—where Dugard was being held—yet police never even searched his property. And then in 2008, the police did a sweep of registered sex offenders in Garrido’s area, yet they only visited his home but never searched it.

There may have been a third opportunity as well. Police are now searching for forensic evidence which links Phillip Garrido to the deaths of 10 prostitutes in the mid-to-late-90s. Several of the bodies were found near an industrial park where Garrido worked at the time. For the sake of argument, let’s say Garrido is responsible for these killings. Had Garrido been caught, Dugard likely would have been rescued 10 years ago. But unfortunately, when prostitutes are victims of violent crimes, their cases are not treated as high priority. How else to explain why the search for a serial killer has gone unsolved for so long?