CHP refuses to put information on electric freeway signs about missing Palo Alto woman

Wamaitha Kaboga Miller

BY EMILY MIBACH
Daily Post Staff Writer

The sons of a Palo Alto woman who has been missing for nearly two weeks want their mother’s name and information broadcast to drivers via the electronic billboards along Highway 101, but the CHP has turned them down.

Njoroge Kaboga-Miller, one of the sons of the missing woman — Wamaitha Kaboga-Miller, 66 — set out on a mission to get the CHP to disseminate information about his mother, such as her license plate number.

Njoroge had put in calls to local state legislators to see if they could pressure the CHP.

However, Marc Hershman, who works for state Sen. Jerry Hill, D-San Mateo, received a notice from the CHP saying they will not do so, according to her other son, Clovis Kaboga-Miller.

According to the letter, the CHP will not post information about missing seniors because “we have found that overuse of the system when it is unlikely to be effective desensitizes the public to the signs.”

While drivers on Highway 101 will not be seeing information about Wamaitha, CHP is keeping an eye out for her car on license plate reader records in the region.

Police will know if her car is picked up by a license plate reader or she checks into a hospital.

Wamaitha was last seen Aug. 17 driving on the Bayfront Expressway toward the Dumbarton Bridge, sometime around 10 a.m., after leaving Country Time Market on University Avenue in East Palo Alto.

She was driving a Silver 2002 Mercedes CLK Coupe with the license plate DP-241LU. The license plate has a handicap designation on it.

Wamaitha Kaboga-Miller is recovering from back surgery and is not very mobile.

She was last seen wearing pajamas, a back brace and a black puffy vest.

On Saturday (Aug 25), the family organized a search party in Palo Alto’s Baylands. More than 200 people showed up, but no worthwhile information regarding Wamaitha’s disappearance was found, Clovis Kaboga-Miller said.