Infamous cases of child murder after 1900 - Definition and Overview

• February 1,2004: 11-year-old Carlie Brucia was abducted at a car wash in Sarasota, Florida on her way home from a sleepover. Her body was found behind a church on February 5. Joseph P. Smith has been charged with her kidnapping and murder.
• April 13, 2003: Laci Peterson's unborn son Connor was found in the San Francisco Bay, California. His mother's dead body was found on the next day, on April 14. Scott Peterson (Laci Peterson's husband) was found guilty of the crime.
• August 24 and August 25, 2002: The bodies of Miranda Gaddis and Ashley Pond were found on the property of Ward Weaver III. He was later arrested for the crime.
• August 4, 2002: Soham murders of 2002 in the UK, Ian Huntley murdered two ten-year-old girls, Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman (convicted December 17 2003).
• July 15, 2002: Samantha Runyon was kidnapped and murdered in Orange County, California. A man named Alejandro Avila was arrested for the crime.
• Summer 2002: Danish girl disappeared in Isle of Wight in United Kingdom. A 52-year-old man admitted that he choked the girl to death.
• March 18, 2002: Miranda Gaddis, Ashley Pond's 13-year old friend, disappeared.
• January 9, 2002: Ashley Pond disappeared on her way from her Oregon City, Oregon apartment complex to her school.
• June 20, 2001: Andrea Pia Yates of Clear Lake City, Houston, Texas drowned her five children in a bathtub.
• July 2000: 11- and 13-year-old sisters were killed by knifeman in Bollnäs, Sweden. The man deluged the older of these girls.
• June 2000: A 10-year-old girl was stabbed in Orrefors, Sweden.
• Spring 2000: Two young men abducted, raped and killed 8- and 10-year-old girls in Kristiansand, Norway.
• December 30, 1998: Javed Iqbal admitted that he killed 100 boys in Pakistan
• April 20, 1997: Laura Kate Smither's naked body was found, decapitated.
• April 3, 1997: Laura Kate Smither was abducted near her Friendswood, Texas home.
• December 26, 1996: Six-year-old JonBenét Ramsey was found strangled to death in the basement of her home.
• Autumn 1996: A five-year-old little girl was raped and killed in Oskarshamn, Sweden.
• June 6, 1996: Darlie Routier's two sons Damon and Devon were stabbed to death in Rowlett, Texas. The mother was later found guilty of the crime.
• January 17, 1996: Amber Hagerman disappeared near her home in Arlington, Texas, and was found murdered four days later. Her death inspired the AMBER Alert broadcast system to help find missing kids.
• October 25, 1995, Susan V. Smith's two sons go missing in Union, South Carolina. Susan alleged that they were kidnapped in a carjacking, but they were found dead in a nearby lake, drowned inside her Mazda Protege. Since Japanese cars take longer to sink than North American cars do, their deaths apparently were agonizing. Susan was charged and found guilty with murdering the boys. She was given the sentence of life in prison.
• 1995, 1996: Marc Dutroux was charged with abduction of six girls, sexually abusing them and causing the death of four of them.
• July 29, 1994: Megan Nicole Kanka was abducted, raped, and murdered by Jesse Timmendequas
• October 1, 1993: Polly Klaas of Petaluma, California was kidnapped from her bedroom during a slumber party and was later strangled to death. Richard Allen Davis was later convicted of the crime and sentenced to death.
• November 24, 1993: The James Bulger murder case.
• April 16, 1992: Kristen French was kidnapped and murdered by Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka
• January 11, 1992: Shanda Sharer was killed by four other girls in Jefferson County, Indiana.
• June 15, 1991: Leslie Mahaffy was kidnapped and murdered by Paul Bernardo
• 1989: The best-known child murders in Finland were done by Veikko "Jammu" Siltavuori, who abducted and murdered two 8-year-old girls in Myllypuro, a suburb in Helsinki.
• May 19, 1983: Diane Downs shoots her three children outside Springfield, Oregon, then brings them to the Emergency Room of a local hospital, claiming that a "bushy-haired stranger" had shot them. The youngest daughter, Cheryl, dies.
• July 27, 1981: Adam Walsh, son of John Walsh, disappeared from a shopping mall in Hollywood, Florida. His head would be found 120 miles away; his body was never found.
• August 2, 1976: Andrea Wilborn is shot to death in Priscilla Davis's Mockingbird Lane Mansion in Fort Worth, Texas, before the assailant goes after Priscilla and boyfriend Stan Farr. Priscilla is injured and Farr dies.
• January, 1966 : The Beaumont Children, siblings Jane (aged 9), Arnna (aged 7) and Grant Beaumont (aged 4) disappear from Glenelg Beach, Adelaide, South Australia after being seen in the company of a lone adult male. Police believe they have been murdered; however, the largest search ever mounted in Australia failed to find their bodies. As recently as the late 1990s police continued to investigate as new witnesses come forward offering information.
• March 1, 1932: Charles Augustus Lindbergh III, son of Charles Lindbergh, the famous aviator, disappeared. He would later be found dead. Bruno Hauptmann was charged and executed for killing the child; many are unsure if he was responsible.
• May 21, 1924: Bobby Franks, age 14, was lured into a car and murdered by Nathan Leopold Jr and Richard Loeb, who dumped the boy's body in a Chicago trainyard. Railroad workers found and reported Franks' body before the murderers could collect a $10,000 ransom.