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Few unsolved cases are as agonizing as that of a missing infant. The devastation felt by a parent who brings a child into the world, only to have them vanish without a trace, is unimaginable. In such cases, there’s often a glimmer of hope that the child may still be alive. Infant abductions are typically carried out by individuals who want to raise the child as their own or sell them for illegal adoption. These children may grow up, unaware of their true origins, living normal lives far from their biological families.
A notable case involves Carlina White, a 23-year-old woman who learned that the woman she believed to be her mother had actually kidnapped her from a hospital when she was just 19 days old. Eventually, Carlina was reunited with her biological parents. While some cases involve suspicions about the parents themselves being responsible for the child’s disappearance, there’s always a chance that these missing infants could still be alive.
10. Marlene Santana
On October 18, 1985, Francesca Santana gave birth to her daughter Marlene at Brookdale Hospital in Brooklyn. Three days later, while Francesca was admiring her newborn in the nursery, a woman in her late twenties with Hispanic features struck up a conversation and complimented Marlene, saying she was 'the prettiest baby there.' Later that night, as Francesca and two relatives were leaving the hospital with Marlene, they were confronted outside by the same woman. She pulled out a gun and forced them to walk six blocks to an isolated junkyard.
The woman then demanded that Francesca hand over Marlene. After pointing a gun directly at the baby and threatening to shoot, Francesca had no choice but to comply. Before they could react, the woman grabbed Marlene, jumped into a car driven by an accomplice, and sped away. Authorities speculated that Marlene might have been sold for illegal adoption or that the kidnapper, unable to have children of her own, decided to take a child to raise as her own. Sadly, 27 years later, Marlene Santana remains missing.
9. Raymond Lamar Green
On November 1, 1978, Donna Green gave birth to a son named Raymond at Grady Memorial Hospital in Atlanta. While Donna was observing her newborn in the nursery, she met an African-American woman who introduced herself as 'Lisa Morris.' The woman claimed she was visiting her sister, who had just given birth. Donna spoke with her several times before being discharged from the hospital and taking Raymond home.
On November 6, Morris unexpectedly visited Donna’s apartment, claiming she wanted to check on how Raymond was doing. Donna welcomed her in to see the baby, and with her brother Tony present at the time, Donna felt safe leaving the room for a brief three-minute shower while Morris stayed with Raymond. However, when Donna returned, Tony said that Morris had taken Raymond outside after he started crying. Donna went searching for them, only to be told by a neighbor that Morris had climbed into a car and driven off with Raymond. After contacting the police, Donna learned that 'Lisa Morris' was an alias, and no one matching her description had any sister who had recently given birth at that hospital. The woman’s identity remains unknown, and sadly, Raymond Lamar Green's whereabouts are still a mystery.
8. Bryan Dos Santos-Gomes
On December 1, 2006, in Fort Myers, Florida, Maria de Fatima Ramos Dos Santos was waiting at a bus stop with her three-week-old son Bryan and a female friend when a Hispanic woman pulled up in an SUV asking for directions. After Maria and her friend got on the bus, the woman followed them and asked for directions again once they got off at their stop. The two decided to offer help and climbed into the woman’s vehicle, only to be suddenly abducted. Maria noticed that the SUV already had a car seat and diaper bag inside. The woman drove them to Estero, demanded $500, and after dropping off Maria and her friend, she drove off with Bryan.
Maria and her husband, Jurandir Gomes Costa, are originally from a village in Brazil and had paid human traffickers to smuggle them into the United States. Initially, it was believed that Bryan had been kidnapped because Jurandir had fallen behind in payments to the traffickers. However, the police later suspected that Bryan's abduction was a random act when another woman from Fort Myers came forward, reporting a similar encounter. On the day Bryan was taken, she had been out for a walk with her infant grandchild when the same Hispanic woman had asked for directions in an SUV. Authorities now believe the woman may have been trying to find a child to raise as her own, but neither Bryan nor his kidnapper have ever been found.
7. Melissa McGuinn
Rebecca and Robert McGuinn lived in Trenton, New Jersey, with their seven-month-old daughter Melissa and two roommates, one of whom was 30-year-old Wanda Faye Reed. On March 6, 1988, Wanda asked Rebecca if she could take Melissa for a walk, and Rebecca agreed. Wanda left and returned eight minutes later with a neighbor, but Melissa was missing. Wanda, who had a mental disability and functioned at the level of a four-year-old, gave conflicting accounts of what happened to the baby.
Initially, Wanda claimed that an unidentified African-American man had knocked her down and taken the baby. She later changed her story, saying she had dropped Melissa into the Delaware River, only to change it again, claiming the neighbor she was with had exchanged the baby for drugs. The neighbor was investigated, but nothing was found to substantiate Wanda’s claims, and the river story was ruled out, as Wanda couldn’t have walked to the river and back in the short time she was gone. It was suspected that Wanda might have harmed Melissa out of jealousy over the attention she had been receiving. Wanda was charged with kidnapping, but was found mentally unfit to stand trial. The charges were dropped, and she was sent to live in an institution for the mentally disabled. Tragically, after 25 years, the fate of Melissa McGuinn remains unknown.
6. Sabrina Aisenberg
On the morning of November 24, 1997, in Valrico, Florida, Marlene Aisenberg woke up to find that her four-month-old daughter, Sabrina, had vanished from her crib. A blue and yellow blanket belonging to Sabrina was also gone. The garage door had been left open overnight, one of the doors to the house was unlocked, and a blonde hair along with an unidentified shoe print was found near the crib. Around 1:00 AM, a neighbor was awakened by his dog barking and thought he heard the sound of a baby crying.
Although there was evidence suggesting Sabrina had been abducted, authorities found it odd that neither Marlene nor her husband Steve had heard anyone entering the house during the night, and the family dog didn’t react. The situation became more controversial after authorities decided to secretly place listening devices in the Aisenberg home, allegedly recording a conversation where Marlene and Steve discussed their daughter’s death. In 1999, the Aisenbergs were indicted on conspiracy charges, but the recordings were too unclear to confirm their involvement. It was later revealed that investigators had misled a judge to obtain permission to bug the Aisenbergs’ home, leading to the charges being dropped. While the Aisenbergs were never fully excluded as suspects, no concrete evidence linked them to Sabrina’s disappearance. Sadly, after more than 15 years, the mystery of Sabrina’s fate remains unsolved.
5. Christopher Abeyta
In the early hours of July 15, 1986, residents of Colorado Springs, Gil and Bernice Abeyta, discovered that their seven-month-old son, Christopher, had disappeared from his crib. The couple had last seen Christopher when they put him to bed at midnight, and they found the front door unlocked. Initially, suspicion fell on the parents, as they were in the process of reconciling after a separation, and this was the first night in some time that Gil was staying at their home. Despite this, the Abeytas were never officially named as suspects, and the Colorado Springs police's investigation came under heavy criticism, especially after much of the evidence was later destroyed.
Christopher’s parents firmly believe he was abducted, citing that they had received a series of hang-up phone calls for six months leading up to his disappearance. These calls stopped abruptly, only to resume months later. Investigations traced the calls to a woman named Emma Bradshaw, with whom Gil had been having an affair. Bradshaw, who had a past involving break-ins, became the prime suspect, although she has always denied any involvement. Nearly 27 years later, the Abeyta family has created a website dedicated to Christopher’s disappearance and is offering a $100,000 reward for any information that could bring them closure.
4. David Blockett
On December 11, 1980, two-week-old David Blockett was taken from his home in Newport News, Virginia by a woman who introduced herself as “Marie Kelly” and claimed to be from the Department of Social Services. Kelly told David’s mother, Vanessa, that they were organizing a children’s event at a nearby medical center and persuaded her to allow David and his two-year-old brother, Frederick, to go. Later that day, Frederick was found wandering alone at a shopping center, holding a note in his pocket with his name and address on it.
Frederick was returned to his mother, but David remained missing. A check with the Department of Social Services revealed no record of a Marie Kelly working for them, nor anyone who matched her description. As Frederick grew older, he recalled vague details of the abduction, including a memory of the woman meeting with a male accomplice. In an odd twist, two of David’s nephews were abducted over 30 years later, though they were quickly found unharmed. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for David, who has never been located and remains missing.
3. Mary Agnes Moroney
In 1930, Michael and Catherine Moroney, living in Chicago with their daughters, Anastasia and two-year-old Mary Agnes, placed an ad for a social services worker to assist with their family. On May 14, a woman named Julia Otis arrived, claiming to be sent by a social worker named Mrs. Henderson. The following day, she asked to take Mary Agnes shopping, and her parents agreed. The next day, the Moroneys received a letter from Otis saying she had taken Mary Agnes to California and would return her in two months.
Two weeks later, the Moroneys received another letter, this time from a woman named Alice Henderson. She stated that Julia Otis was her cousin and had kidnapped Mary Agnes due to the loss of her husband and baby the previous year. The Moroneys never heard from either woman again, but authorities later determined both letters had been written in the same handwriting. In 1952, a woman named Mary McClelland came forward, claiming to be Mary Agnes Moroney and reunited with her family. However, doubts arose, as McClelland did not bear the hernia scar that Mary Agnes had, and a doctor asserted that he had delivered McClelland the year before Mary Agnes was born. Decades later, after McClelland's death, DNA testing confirmed that she was not Mary Agnes Moroney.
2. Lisa Irwin
At 4:00 AM on October 4, 2011, Jeremy Irwin returned to his home in Kansas City, Missouri, to find that his 10-month-old daughter, Lisa, was no longer in her crib. Lisa's mother, Deborah Bradley, said she had last seen her daughter when she put her to bed the previous night. Jeremy was shocked to discover that several lights in the house were on, the front door was unlocked, Lisa's bedroom window was open, and three cell phones were missing. Deborah, who had been drinking heavily the night before, soon became a person of interest in the case, with suspicion surrounding her role in Lisa's disappearance.
The police claimed Deborah failed a lie detector test and conducted a cadaver dog search of the home, with the dog allegedly detecting the scent of a dead body near Deborah's bed. However, no evidence was collected from the house to substantiate this claim. Lisa's family continues to believe she was abducted, a theory supported by three witnesses who reported seeing an unknown man carrying a baby in a diaper on a road three miles away from the Irwin home on the same night. A month after Lisa vanished, Jeremy reported his debit card stolen, and in May 2012, it was reportedly used to access a website offering false birth certificates. Despite investigating these leads, authorities have yet to determine what happened to Lisa Irwin.
1. Kamiyah Mobley
On July 10, 1998, Shanara Mobley gave birth to her daughter Kamiyah at University Medical Center in Jacksonville, Florida. Over the course of the day, Shanara had several interactions with an unidentified African-American nurse. Around eight hours after Kamiyah was born, the nurse claimed that the baby had an issue with her temperature and took her out of the room. That was the last time anyone saw Kamiyah or the nurse, as they seemingly left the hospital together and vanished.
Although the woman wore a nurse’s uniform and an ID badge, the hospital had no record of her ever working there. She appeared to have some medical knowledge and was familiar with the hospital’s layout. When not pretending to be a nurse, the woman posed as a relative of the Mobley family and often inquired about when the baby would be leaving the nursery. Shanara later filed a lawsuit against the hospital over Kamiyah's abduction and was awarded a $1.5 million settlement. It's believed that the woman was intentionally scouting for a child to abduct and raise as her own. If Kamiyah Mobley is still alive, she is now 15 years old and may have no knowledge of her true identity.
