Vidocq Society

Current Cases

Services for America's Unknown Child

Please help the Philadelphia Police Department and the Vidocq Society solve one of America's greatest mysteries, the 1957 death of a young boy whose identity has never been determined.

In October 1998, the award-winning Fox television program America's Most Wanted featured the bizarre unsolved 1957 death of "The Boy in The Box" and numerous leads have been funneled to the Philadelphia Homicide Division. Vidocq co-founders Bill Fleisher, V.S.M., and Frank Bender, V.S.M., along with now-retired Philadelphia Police Intelligence Bureau officer (and Vidocq Society Member) Sam Weinstein, who was the second to respond to the roadside crime scene in 1957, were seen on the program, along with Richard Walter, V.S.M., a forensic psychologist and Vidocq Society co-founder.

Bender is the famed artist/sculptor responsible for what is probably the most famous capture by America's Most Wanted: family killer John List. Bender's "aged" bust of List was so uncannily accurate that shortly after its broadcast a viewer was able to direct authorities to the murderer. In the October broadcast Bender displayed bust that he created just for the program that revealed how he believes the young victim's father may have looked in 1957.

The case, featured on the the TV program's former Web site, profoundly affected viewers around the country. As a result, the case's America's Most Wanted chat room remained open for more than three weeks, three times longer than normal.

Chat room participants, unknown to each other before the TV broadcast, also created a special private e-mail ring to share theories and suggestions. All case-germane postings in the AMW chat area and e-mail ring postings shared with the Vidocq Society were reviewed by the Philadelphia Homicide Division.

On Nov. 3, 1998, pursuant to an Orphans' Court order, the boy's remains were exhumed for DNA analysis. He was reburied with full honors as "America's Unknown Child" in services at beautiful Ivy Hill Cemetery on Nov. 11.

Services Held

The Vidocq Society offers its heartfelt and sincere thanks to the approximately 100 people who attended the burial services. If you are touched by this sad death, your gift, in the name of "America's Unknown Child" would be greatly appreciated by the The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in Washington, D.C.

National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
Unknown Child Fund
2101 Wilson Boulevard; Suite 500
Arlington, Virginia 22201-3077
1-800-THE-LOST

PHILADELPHIA, PA. – Public graveside services for "America's Unknown Child" were held on Wednesday, Nov. 11, 1998.

Among those participating in the services were:

Ben J. Ermini, Director of the Missing Childrens Division at National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in suburban Washington, D.C.;
Assistant Philadelphia District Attorney Charles Gallagher;
Richard Costello, president of Philadelphia Lodge 5, Fraternal Order of Police;
and Michael Lutz, president of the Pennsylvania State Lodge of the Fraternal Order of Police.

Philadelphia Homicide Detective Thomas Augustine and all key members of the law enforcement team that is conducting the investigation into one of America's greatest crime mysteries also attended the graveside service, along with members of the Philadelphia FBI's Evidence Recovery Team.

On Nov. 3, 1998 Philadelphia Homicide Division detectives executed an Orphan's Court order that brought this baffling case to a new milestone. The court order directed law enforcement to exhume the child and, after testing, re-inter him in Ivy Hill Cemetery. The Vidocq Society is supporting the investigation. A retired Philadelphia police intelligence unit detective who was the second patrolman to respond to the crime scene in 1957 is among the Vidocq Society Members helping with the revivified police investigation.

America's Most Wanted featured the case on Oct. 3, 1998, after the Vidocq Society convinced the Fox Television program that the child might be identified by someone outside of Philadelphia. As a result, numerous fresh leads have been received by Philadelphia Homicide detectives, leading to the exhumation and peaking investigator's hopes that a solution is possible for the decades-old case.

Craig Mann of the Mann Funeral Home (whose father originally buried the dead boy in 1957) donated the coffin, burial vault and funeral services. The cemetery donated the gravesite, according to David G. Drysdale Sr. and Jr., Ivy Hill Cemetery's managers. A beautiful serpentine black headstone is being donated by Lawrence F.M. Conroy of Cartledge-Gallagher-Stefan, Inc. of Cheltenham, Pennsylvania.