10 Kidnapped Children Who Were Found Years Later

Kidnapped-Children-Who-Were-Found-Years-Later

Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re looking at infamous and shocking cases of minors who were forcefully taken, only to be discovered years later.

Carlina White

In 1987, Joy White and Carl Tyson took their baby, Carlina White, to Harlem Hospital Center in New York City as she had a fever. However, Annugetta Pettway, who was dressed as a nurse, took the infant and disappeared. For 23 years, White was raised as Pettway’s child. But after discovering her birth certificate was faked, White was told by Pettway that her mother abandoned her. Not believing her tale, White searched online databases for missing children. There, she discovered images of herself and got in contact with authorities. In 2011, a DNA test confirmed she was the missing victim, and she was reunited with her biological parents. Pettway was sentenced to 12 years in jail and was released in 2021.

Alex Batty

After being raised by his grandmother, Susan Caruana, young Alex Batty was taken on a trip with his mother, Melanie Batty, and her father, David, to Marbella, Spain. However, they never returned to the UK. Melanie sent Caruana a video that detailed plans to live an alternative lifestyle. In 2023, Alex was found walking near Toulouse, France. He had left his mother and grandfather to return to the UK. For the past 6 years, the trio lived nomadically across Europe, living in various communes with other families. Alex was homeschooled and was made to work to earn money. Thankfully, he was reunited with his grandmother. However, at the time of writing, Melanie and David have yet to be located.

Gregory Jean

In 2010, Gregory Jean Jr. and his brother, Samuel, visited their father, Gregory Jean Sr. and stepmom, Samantha Davis. Yet, while his younger brother was allowed to return to Florida, Gregory was not and was forced to stay in Jonesboro, Georgia. Even though his mom, Lisa Smith, alerted welfare agencies, the police weren’t informed of the incident. Gregory spent 4 years at his father’s. During that time, he was kept home from school, beaten, and mistreated, while his step-siblings were given preferential treatment. In 2014, Gregory planned his escape by sending Smith a friend request on Facebook. The police acted and searched the property, finding Gregory in a nook behind a false wall. Gregory Jean Sr. and Davis were charged for their crimes.

Sun Wei

In 1995, little Sun Wei was walking home from preschool in Liangshan Yi, Sichuan Province, China. However, he didn’t return home. Instead, Sun was lured by a stranger with candy into a van. He was then sold to a couple in Jieyang, Guangdong Province, where his name and birth date were changed. Sun’s parents, Sun Zhenghua and Peng Lianhui, didn’t have a photo of their son, making finding him difficult. Zhenghua traveled across the country, working odd jobs while searching for their child. As a teen, Sun left the unkind couple who favored their biological daughter. He was later persuaded by friends to upload his DNA to a missing persons database, which led to a reunion with his biological parents 20 years after he vanished.

Kayla Unbehaun

In 2017, young Kayla Unbehaun visited her mother, Heather, at her home in Wheaton, Illinois. The next day, her father, Ryan, went to pick up his daughter, who he had full custody of. Instead, both mother and daughter had vanished. The search to find Kayla was unsuccessful, and there seemed little hope. In 2022, Netflix’s “Unsolved Mysteries” featured an episode on a taken child that contained an age-progression photo of Kayla. In 2023, a store owner in Asheville, North Carolina, who had seen the episode, spotted a teenager who matched the image. They called the police, who discovered it was Kayla and reunited her with her father. Heather was arrested and charged for her crime.

Steven Stayner & Timothy White

In 1972, young Steven Stayner was seized by Kenneth Parnell in Merced, California. For years, Stayner was horribly mistreated by Parnell as they moved around California. When he got older, Parnell attempted to use Stayner to take another victim. However, the boy sabotaged each attempt. Using another method, in 1980, Parnell took little Timothy White. Desperate to prevent White from suffering as he had, Stayner escaped with White 16 days after he was taken. Parnell served 5 years in jail for taking Stayner and White. He was later sentenced for an unrelated case to 25 years to life and died in 2008. Sadly, Stayner passed away in a motorcycle accident in 1989, and White in 2010 from a pulmonary embolism.

Steve Carter

In 1977, Mark Barnes’s girlfriend Charlotte Moriarty vanished with their son Marx Panama Barnes in Hawaii. While Barnes reported the incident, he never saw the pair again. Moriarty handed Marx to a stranger and gave cops a fake name and birthdate for her child. She then checked into a mental health hospital before disappearing. In 2011, after reading about Carlina White’s story, Steve Carter in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, researched his own history. After all, when he was four, Carter was adopted from an orphanage in Honolulu. He visited the website “Missingkids.com” and found an age-progression image of Marx that looked like him. Carter then had a DNA test that confirmed he was the missing child after 34 years, leading to him reconnecting with his birth family.

Elisabeth Fritzl

In 1984, in Amstetten, Austria, 18-year-old Elisabeth Fritzl was asked by her father, Josef, to help install a door in the basement. He then locked her up in this newly created prison. For 24 years, Elisabeth was hidden while Josef told the community she had run off to join a cult. Elisabeth was forced to give birth to her father’s children several times. In 2008, the eldest daughter, Kerstin, was taken to the hospital by Josef. His odd behavior and explanation for where her mother was concerned staff, who alerted authorities. When Josef returned with Elisabeth, the police swooped in, and the truth was discovered. Josef pleaded guilty to the charges and was sentenced to life imprisonment.

Jaycee Dugard

In 2009, Phillip Garrido was at the University of California, Berkeley, to see the campus along with his two daughters. However, their strange behavior led to Garrido’s parole officer calling him to the office. He arrived with the two girls and their mother, Jaycee Dugard, who had vanished in 1991. That year, the young Dugard had been seized by Garrido and his wife, Nancy, as she walked to her school bus in Meyers, California. While people saw the seizure and there was a thorough search for her, Dugard couldn’t be located for 18 years. In 2011, Garrido was sentenced to 431 years to life imprisonment, while Nancy received 36 years to life. Dugard wrote two books on her experience.

Michelle Knight, Amanda Berry, & Gina DeJesus

In 2002, 21-year-old Michelle Knight vanished. In 2003, teenager Amanda Berry disappeared. In 2004, teenager Gina DeJesus was captured. Each was taken from Cleveland, Ohio, by Ariel Castro, who kept them at his home and mistreated them. In 2013, Berry managed to get the attention of neighbors, who broke a hole big enough for her, along with her daughter by Castro, to escape. This led to the authorities coming and saving Knight and DeJesus, too. Castro was arrested shortly after the rescue. He pleaded guilty to a litany of charges. Castro was sentenced to life imprisonment plus 1,000 years without the possibility of parole. However, he died by his own hand a month into the sentence.


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