Top 30 Missing People Who Were Eventually Found

Top 30 Missing People Who Were Eventually Found

Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for the most infamous times people vanished without a trace, only to be located eventually, sometimes decades later.

#30: Paul Fronczak
In 1964, Dora Fronczak handed over her newborn son Paul Fronczak to a nurse at the Michael Reese Hospital in Chicago, Illinois. Unfortunately, this nurse was an imposter, who disappeared with the baby. A massive investigation was launched, and about one year later, authorities discovered an abandoned toddler, whom the Fronczaks believed was their missing son. In 2012, a suspicious Fronczak decided to take a DNA test and found that he wasn’t related to the people he called his parents. In fact, his true identity was Jack Rosenthal, a twin who had disappeared in 1965. It was later discovered that the real Paul Fronczak was a man named Kevin Ray Baty, although his identity wasn’t publicly revealed until after his demise in 2020.

#29: Tanya Rider
In 2007, Tom Rider was distraught at his home in Maple Valley, Washington. His wife Tanya had disappeared for about a week after completing her shift at a nearby supermarket. When Tom called the police, they offered little help, as Tanya was captured on CCTV leaving the store. Eventually, they tracked her cellphone, which led them down her usual route home. There, they discovered Tanya’s crashed car, overturned in a ravine and hidden by vegetation. She had somehow survived 8 days without food or water, enduring severe injuries including a broken collarbone, as well as fractured ribs and vertebra. Her left leg was also crushed and was very nearly amputated. Remarkably, Tanya has no recollection of what caused the crash.

#28: Lucy Ann Johnson
In 1961, Lucy Ann Johnson disappeared from her home in Surrey, British Columbia, Canada. Bizarrely, it wasn’t until 1965 that her husband, Marvin, reported her missing. This made him a prime suspect in her disappearance, but no evidence of wrongdoing was found. In 2013, Johnson’s daughter, Linda, initiated her own investigation, which led her to a small territory called Yukon, where her mother previously lived. With aid from the local media, Linda met a woman named Rhonda, who claimed that Johnson was also her mother. Turns out Johnson had left Marvin due to domestic violence but he prevented her from taking her two children along. She then relocated back to Yukon, where she remarried and had four other kids.

#27: Jayme Closs
In 2018, Jake Patterson invaded the Closs home in Barron, Wisconsin, armed with a shotgun. He fatally shot James and Denise Closs, before abducting their daughter Jayme and taking her to his cabin in Gordon, Wisconsin. Patterson had become fixated on Closs after seeing her get off a school bus. 88 days later, Patterson put Closs under his bed before leaving home, assuming that she was too scared to escape. She seized the opportunity and fled, subsequently encountering a woman who recognized her from the news. It didn’t take long for the cops to locate Patterson and extract a confession from him. He was sentenced to two life sentences without parole for the murders, plus 40 years for the kidnapping.

#26: Bryon Anthony McCane II (Bizzy Bone)
Today, Bryon Anthony McCane II, AKA Bizzy Bone, is a Grammy-winning musician best known as a member of the rap group Bone Thugs-n-Harmony. However, his life took a dramatic turn in 1981 when he and his sisters were taken by their mother’s boyfriend. Deceived into believing that their mother and grandmother had died, the siblings were transported all over northern Oklahoma. Eventually, they settled on a reservation in Kaw, Oklahoma. In 1983, the TV film “Adam” was broadcast, which featured photos of missing children before the end credits. One of these was McCane. His babysitter recognized the picture and promptly contacted the authorities. This led to McCane and his sisters being reunited with their mother.

#25: Natascha Kampusch
On March 2nd 1998, Natascha Kampusch left her home in Vienna, Austria, for school and disappeared without a trace. Police launched a massive investigation, searching many vehicles, but they couldn’t find her. Kampusch had been abducted by communications technician Wolfgang Přiklopil, who confined her to a cellar in his home. She remained under captivity for eight years, during which she was assaulted by Přiklopil, both physically and sexually. In 2006, while cleaning Přiklopil’s van, she ran outside and alerted neighbors, who called the police. That night, Přiklopil decided to end his own life rather than face justice. Kampusch later released books on her experience and was briefly a talk show host. Her story was immortalized in the 2013 film, “3096 Days.”

#24: Natasha Ryan
In 1998, Natasha Ryan was reported missing from her hometown of Rockhampton, Queensland, in Australia. The subsequent investigation eventually led the police to serial killer Leonard Fraser, who seemingly confessed to her murder. However, during Fraser’s trial in 2003, police received an anonymous tip claiming that Ryan was, in fact, alive and hiding in the house of her boyfriend, Scott Black. The police raided Black's house in North Rockhampton and found her there. She had willingly left home to live with him secretly, hiding in a cupboard when guests came over. Scott was sentenced to three years in jail for perjury, two of which were suspended, while Ryan was fined $1000 for the false investigation. In 2008, the two got married.

#23: Shawn Hornbeck & Ben Ownby
In 2002, Shawn Hornbeck disappeared while riding his bicycle to a friend’s house in Richwoods, Missouri. The police initially faced challenges in their investigation, and the case ultimately went cold. In 2007, officers were at an apartment complex in Kirkwood, Missouri, when they spotted a suspicious truck. A few days earlier, a similar vehicle had been involved in the kidnapping of teenager Ben Ownby. The cops traced the truck to Michael Devlin, and they raided his apartment. Inside, they not only found Ownby, but also Hornbeck, who had been presented as Devlin’s son for several years. Devlin later pleaded guilty to a host of charges and was sentenced to a staggering total of 4,240 years in prison.

#22: Carlina White
In 1987, Carlina White, then an infant, was taken by her parents to New York City’s Harlem Hospital Center. There, a woman named Ann Pettway posed as a nurse and abducted her. White was subsequently brought up as Nejdra Nance in Bridgeport, Connecticut. In 2005, after discovering her birth certificate was fake, White confronted Pettway about her true identity and was told that she had been abandoned as a baby. This explanation didn’t satisfy her. White initiated her own investigation and found a baby picture of herself on a missing children’s website. She contacted the authorities and DNA analysis confirmed her real identity. In 2012, Pettway entered a plea deal and received a 12-year prison sentence. She was ultimately released in 2021.

#21: Elisabeth Fritzl
In 2008, Josef Fritzl took his seriously ill daughter Kerstin to a hospital in Amstetten, Austria. However, his odd behavior and strange explanation on her mother’s whereabouts raised concerns among the staff, prompting them to alert the police. Fritzl eventually brought Kerstin’s mother, Elisabeth, to the hospital, only to be arrested by the police. Elisabeth actually was Fritzl’s daughter, who he claimed had run away to join a cult, back in 1984. In reality, for 24 years, he secretly confined her to the basement of the family house and forced her to bear seven children for him. After Elisabeth’s video testimony was played at his trial, Fritzl changed his plea to guilty on all charges. In 2009, he was sentenced to life imprisonment.

#20: Robert McDonough
If you saw this in a movie, you would think, “Nah, there’s no way.” In May of 2013, an elderly man named Robert McDonough went missing from his Limington, Maine home. The danger was compounded by the fact that McDonough has dementia. The authorities were called and searched the nearby woods throughout the night, but found nothing. The next morning, a local news crew stationed themselves outside McDonough’s house to report on his disappearance. And that’s when McDonough quite literally strolled into the shot and asked the news crew what was happening. McDonough was safe and healthy, and it was reported that he had wandered out of his house and likely into the neighboring forest. The rescue team may’ve just missed him during their search.

#19: Timothy Carney
A young New Jersey man named Timothy Carney went missing in September of 2004 after calling his employer and telling them that he would be late for work. That night, Carney’s empty vehicle was discovered near Newark. His parents searched years for their son, and he was finally found safe on September 23, 2011 - nearly seven full years from the day he disappeared. Unfortunately, not much information was given regarding his situation. Carney’s parents believe that he was influenced by a religious organization known as The Gospel Outreach to abandon all contact with his family.

#18: Carlos De Salazar
A Spanish doctor by the name of Carlos Sanchez Ortiz de Salazar disappeared from the city of Seville in 1996. The story goes that de Salazar was severely depressed and fled his home country to begin a new life elsewhere. There was no further news, and de Salazar was even declared legally dead in 2010. Five years after that, mushroom pickers found de Salazar living in the woods of Tuscany, Italy. De Salazar told them who he was and proved it by showing them some documents. Photos of these documents were later shared with a missing persons organization. Unfortunately, this story has a frustratingly ambiguous ending. After being found, de Salazar had taken down his makeshift home and once again fled into the wilderness to be on his own.

#17: Petra Pazsitka
Back in 1984, Petra Pazsitka was due to arrive at her brother’s birthday party. She never made it. A suspected criminal then confessed to killing Pazsitka. The case was closed in 1989, with many believing that Pazsitka had been killed. There was no further news until 2015, when police were called to a home burglary in Düsseldorf. The victim said her name was “Mrs. Schneider” but eventually came clean - she was actually the presumed-dead Petra Pazsitka. She had been living under a false identity for over 30 years. When found, Pazsitka refused to give a reason for her disappearance and explicitly asked not to be reunited with her family. However, she also claimed that family troubles were not the reason for her sudden departure.

#16: Harold Wayne Lovell
This is another person who was presumably killed. But this wasn’t at the hands of some random criminal - it was at the hands of John Wayne Gacy. Many believed that Harold Wayne Lovell was killed by Gacy back in the late ‘70s, but his body was never identified. In the early 2010s, police were attempting to identify some unknown Gacy victims when they started looking into Lovell. Their search took them across the country to South Florida, which is where they made a shocking discovery. Lovell was alive and well, and he didn’t even know that he was presumed dead, let alone a victim of Gacy’s - whom he had actually met and worked for before his disappearance! According to Lovell, he had fled Chicago following some family troubles and stayed out of contact for the following 30 odd years.

#15: Julian Hernandez
In this case, a simple college application uncovered a 13-year-long ruse. In August of 2002, young Julian Hernandez was taken by his father, Bobby. Bobby had left behind a note for Julian’s mother, saying only that he had taken their son. No other details were given, and father and son seemingly disappeared into thin air. They had actually gone to Cleveland and developed new identities, with Bobby obtaining a social security card under the name Jonathan Mangina. The ruse finally ended when Julian applied for college in 2015. A school counselor discovered that Julian was legally missing and notified authorities. 19-year-old Julian, who has forgiven his father, was then reunited with his mother, and Bobby was sentenced to four years in prison.

#14: Denise Bolser
It’s amazing how much trouble money can cause. Back in 1985, 24-year-old Denise Bolser went missing while working as a bookkeeper. The only clue was a note left to her husband which read, “We have your wife.” While the police received many tips over the years, Bolser was eventually tracked by a private investigator and found in 2002. She was living in Florida under the name Denise James. According to Bolser, she had fled to hide from her old boss. Bolser had skimmed more than $10,000 from the company of her boss’ wife, allegedly on the orders of her employer. When Bolser began discussing the ruse, her co-conspirator reportedly threatened to kill her. She fled to live a new life, and has since been reunited with her parents.

#13: Steve Carter
Imagine this: you’re browsing online when you come across your own picture on a website of missing children. That’s exactly what happened to Steve Carter. After reading about a kidnapping, Carter found himself on the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children’s page, after which he saw an age progression photo of a missing child. He thought that the grown man’s face bore a startling resemblance to his own, so he contacted the police and they got to work. Turns out that Steve Carter was actually Marx Barnes, and he had gone missing over 30 years earlier after going for a walk with his mother. It’s believed that Carter’s mother took him to an orphanage and put him up for adoption under a false name. She then disappeared herself, leaving behind many frustrating questions.

#12: Jan Broberg
Today, Jan Broberg Felt is a professional actress, having found success on stage and fame on The WB’s “Everwood,” in which she portrayed Nurse Louise. Unfortunately, Broberg suffered a harrowing childhood that involved multiple kidnappings. Back in 1972, Broberg’s parents met the Berchtold family through church. Broberg quickly developed a father-daughter relationship with Robert Berchtold. Unfortunately, Berchtold kidnapped Broberg and took her to his trailer home in Mexico. She was eventually rescued, but then kidnapped again two years later, and the now-teen proceeded to live with Berchtold in California for four months. She was eventually rescued by the FBI, and her story was later turned into the Netflix documentary “Abducted in Plain Sight.”

#11: Brenda Heist
On the morning of February 8, 2002, Brenda Heist dropped her children off at school and disappeared without a trace. The family was understandably devastated, and Heist’s husband petitioned to have her declared legally dead. The case was solved in 2013 to …mixed results. Heist intentionally left her family in Pennsylvania behind to live as a vagrant in Florida. She had hitchhiked there with a group of homeless people and spent the next decade working odd jobs in the state. According to Heist, she had abandoned her family for stress-related reasons. But this story does not have a happy ending. Heist’s husband claimed that he had no desire to see her, and her now-grown daughter doesn’t think her mother “deserves to see [her].”

#10: Michele Whitaker
South Carolina woman Michele Whitaker went missing in August of 2002 after a friend gave her a lift to a truck stop. Her case later turned into a homicide investigation, and police suspected a man named Jonathan Vick. Vick was the boyfriend of Whitaker’s co-worker, and she had also gone missing. However, police were unable to prove that Vick killed Whitaker. The case went cold until 2008. An Oregon woman was watching a “Forensic Files” episode about Vick when a picture of Whitaker flashed on screen. The woman recognized Whitaker as her neighbor and contacted the authorities. Her neighbor was indeed the missing Michele Whitaker, and she later told her family that she had fled South Carolina to start a new life in Oregon.

#9: Gabriel Nagy
When one hears “fugue state,” they probably think of that “Breaking Bad” episode where Walt walks around a supermarket in his birthday suit. Well, that was reality for Gabriel Nagy. Back in January of 1987, the husband and father disappeared under mysterious circumstances. He was reported missing after he failed to return home for lunch, and his burnt-out vehicle was later discovered. Nagy remained missing until 2012, when a police officer tracked him down and found him alive and well. Nagy had seemingly suffered a dissociative fugue state, a rare psychiatric disorder characterized by a loss of memory of one’s identity and personality. Put simply, Nagy forgot who he was and wandered away to start a new life.

#8: Lula Hood
There’s just something about Florida that apparently attracts people. A woman named Lula Hood went missing all the way back in 1970. According to Hood’s relatives, she simply disappeared from Illinois without a trace. No word was heard until 1996, when Hood’s family was told that her remains were found in a Florida brickyard. That remained the official story until 2009, when the remains were tested for DNA. Surprise - they didn’t belong to Hood. The case was reopened, and investigators eventually tracked Hood to another place in Florida, where she had been living for the last 40 years. According to Hood’s daughter, Hood got into a squabble with a family member and was told to leave. She did - going all the way to Florida and living her life in complete anonymity.

#7: Amanda Eller
Yoga teacher and physical therapist Amanda Eller decided to go for a hike through the Hawaiian wilderness. She never returned home, and her boyfriend quickly reported her missing. Her vehicle was found abandoned near Maui’s Kahakapao Trail, but there were no signs of Eller. She had accidentally wandered off the trail and found herself in the middle of the remote wilderness. When it was obvious that help wasn’t coming, she was forced to live off wild plants, berries, and rainwater. After over two long and grueling weeks, Eller was finally located by a search party and rescued via helicopter. She was in surprisingly good condition and was treated at a local hospital for a fractured leg.

#6: Bowe Bergdahl
In May of 2009, soldier Bowe Bergdahl was working counterinsurgency in Afghanistan when his friend and fellow officer Brian Bradshaw was fatally hit by a roadside bomb. This likely tarnished Bergdahl’s outlook on the war effort. He wrote to his family a few days later, and his email was full of critical language against the US army. Bergdahl subsequently disappeared under mysterious circumstances on June 30. No one knew where he was, and it would be almost a month before an insurgent group revealed that they were holding Bergdahl prisoner. He served as a POW until May 31, 2014, when he was freed in exchange for Taliban prisoners. Later investigations showed that Bergdahl was likely snatched after abandoning his post. He was subsequently court martialed and demoted. Talk about a not-so-welcome home.

#5: Nguyen Thi Van
Vietnamese high school student Nguyen Thi Van vanished in 1992. Van returned home but found herself locked out because of the late time, so she relocated to a nearby karaoke bar. The next morning, a disoriented Van woke up in China. She had been taken to the country by a woman named Thanh, who tortured her and her friends and forced them to marry older, local Chinese men. She eventually fled with the help of a local driver and returned to Hanoi. In a moment that would be too unbelievable for fiction, Van approached a man on the street and asked for directions. That man happened to be her uncle. He took her to the family home, and Van was reunited with her family after 21 years.

#4: Michelle Knight, Amanda Berry & Gina DeJesus
This is easily one of the most famous kidnapping stories of our time, having attained fame through its dramatic conclusion. Between 2002 and 2004, a man named Ariel Castro kidnapped the three young women off the streets of Cleveland by offering them lifts. They remained in his house for roughly a decade and were subjected to various forms of horrible torture. It wasn’t until May 6, 2013 that Berry saw her chance of escape. Castro had accidentally left a door unlocked, and Berry was able to contact passing neighbors. They helped Berry and her daughter escape the house, and she telephoned the police to report the kidnappings, after which the other two were rescued. Castro was arrested that same day, and he would later take his own life in his detention cell.

#3: Elizabeth Smart
Back in June of 2002, a man named Brian David Mitchell broke into the Smart household and abducted teenaged Elizabeth Smart from her bedroom. Her sister, Mary Katherine, was also in the room at the time of the abduction, but faked being still sleeping. Elizabeth remained with Mitchell and his wife for the next nine months. Mary Katherine suddenly realized that the man who took her sister was the same man who had worked on their house as a general laborer one day. A sketch of the man was drawn up and released to news outlets. One day while walking in Sandy, Utah, several eyewitnesses recognized Mitchell’s face and notified police of his location. He and his wife were successfully captured, and Smart was finally rescued.

#2: Jaycee Dugard
Jaycee Dugard was tased and snatched off the street while approaching her school bus on June 10, 1991. The perpetrators were husband-wife duo Phillip and Nancy Garrido. Despite numerous people witnessing the kidnapping, the trail quickly went cold, and no one heard anything of Dugard for the next 18 years. In that time, Dugard was consistently assaulted by Phillip Garrido and bore him two daughters. The case was finally broken by a special events manager named Lisa Campbell. Garrido was visiting UC Berkeley with his two daughters, and their “erratic” behavior caught Campbell’s attention. After getting his name through the booking of an appointment, she notified the police, which eventually led to Garrido’s arrest. Dugard was finally rescued and reunited with her mother on August 27, 2009 - now almost 30 years old.

#1: Steven Stayner
On December 4, 1972, Steven Stayner was abducted by Ervin Murphy and Kenneth Parnell. Stayner proceeded to live as Parnell’s son while being continuously subjected to his depraved whims. Parnell attempted to use Stayner in other kidnappings, but Stayner was uncooperative. In fact, on the night of March 1, 1980, he and a young boy named Timmy White escaped Parnell’s house and made their way to a local police station. Stayner was finally reunited with his family the following day. He wasn’t the boy they remembered, but a teenager now. He found it difficult to adjust and mostly kept his experiences to himself. After Stayner died in a motorcycle accident at 24, Timmy White served as a pallbearer.

What’s the most famous case of pets being kidnapped? Kids Boot Ace? Lady Gaga’s dogs? Hi Joe? Or something else? Let us know below.