Mary Lyall

Mary Lyall of Ballston Spa has been a passionate and dedicated advocate for finding missing persons and helping families of missing loved ones for nearly 20 years.

When their daughter, Suzanne Lyall, went missing in 1998, Mary and her late husband, Doug, turned their sadness and quiet desperation into a positive force for change with the creation of the Center for Hope. Center for Hope helps other families find missing loved ones and advocates for state and federal legislation and initiatives to better respond to missing person cases.

In 1999, Mary and Doug helped get the “Suzanne’s Law Campus Safety Act” passed in New York, which requires all colleges in the state to have plans that provide for the investigation of missing students and violent felony offenses committed on campus.

Mr. and Mrs. Lyall’s impassioned advocacy on behalf of their daughter and all families of missing persons got “Suzanne’s Law” passed on the federal level in 2003. Suzanne’s Law requires that police notify the National Crime Information Center when someone between the ages of 18 and 21 is reported missing, and is part of the national Amber Alert law.

Thanks to the strong advocacy of the Lyalls, New York became the first state in the nation to create a Missing Persons Remembrance Monument located next to the State Museum in Albany. New York State also recognizes a Missing Persons Day that brings together family members of missing persons to share ways of coping and to keep hope alive.

In recent years, the Lyalls conceived of the idea of putting the pictures of missing persons on drink coasters with the hope this will generate tips that could solve a cold case. This led to the creation of the “Coasters for Hope” program that has distributed 75,000 drink coasters with pictures and information on missing persons to restaurants and taverns across the Capital Region.

Mary Lyall is a community hero and truly a wonderful person, who with her late husband, Doug, turned their personal tragedy into a mission to ensure that what happened to their family is never experienced by someone else’s family.