This is a list of murdered American children that details notable murders among thousands of cases of subjects who were or are believed to have been under the age of 18 upon their deaths. Cases listed are stated to be unsolved, solved or pending and, in some cases, where the victims' remains have never been found or identified. This list is inclusive only of subjects who have an existing article on the English-language Wikipedia.
| Victim(s) | Date of death | Age | Location | Status | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Elsie Paroubek | April 8, 1911 | 4 | Chicago, Illinois | Unsolved | Murdered and dumped into a drainage canal.[1] |
| Little Lord Fauntleroy | 1920 or 1921 | 5–7 | Waukesha, Wisconsin | Unsolved, unidentified | Found dead in a quarry.[2] |
| Babes in the Wood murders (Pine Grove Furnace) | November 24, 1934 | 8–12 | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | Solved | Murder–suicide and familicide.[3] |
| Victim(s) | Date of death | Age | Location | Status | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Joseph Augustus Zarelli | February 1957 | 4 | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | Unsolved, identified | Unidentified until 2022.[4] |
| Maria Ridulph | December 3, 1957 | 7 | Sycamore, Illinois | Unsolved | A suspect was convicted in 2012, but was eventually exonerated in 2016.[5] [6] |
| Sharon Lee Gallegos | July 17–24, 1960 | 4 | Congress, Arizona | Unsolved, identified | Kidnapping and murder victim, snatched from right in front of her house. Her body was found in the desert 10 days after her abduction. The exact cause of death remains undetermined, but was ruled a homicide.[7] |
| 16th Street Baptist Church bombing | September 15, 1963 | 11–14 | Birmingham, Alabama | Solved | Four girls killed in a bombing by the Ku Klux Klan.[8] |
| Sylvia Likens | October 26, 1965 | 16 | Indianapolis, Indiana | Solved | Her caretaker Gertrude Baniszewski was sentenced to life imprisonment and released on parole in 1985.[9] |
| Jane Durrua | November 5, 1968 | 13 | Keansburg, New Jersey | Solved | [10] |
| Marina Habe | December 30, 1968 | 17 | Los Angeles County, California | Unsolved | Daughter of writer Hans Habe and actress Eloise Hardt. Possible victim of Charles Manson’s followers.[11] |
| Victim(s) | Date of death | Age | Location | Status | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dean Corll victims | September 25, 1970 - August 3, 1973 | 13 - 17 | Houston, Texas | Solved, unidentified | One victim remains unidentified, Harris County John Doe (1973).[12] |
| Rhonda Johnson and Sharon Shaw | August 4, 1971 | 14, 13 | Galveston, Texas | Solved | Michael Self convicted in 1975, however murderer Edward Bell later confessed to killing them.[13] |
| Alphabet murders | November 16, 1971 – November 26, 1973 | 10–11 | Rochester, New York | Unsolved | The victims were Carmen Colón, Michelle Maenza, and Wanda Walkowicz.[14] |
| Timothy McCoy | January 3, 1972 | 16 | Chicago, Illinois | Solved | Victim remained unidentified until 1986; the first known victim of at least 33 of serial killer John Wayne Gacy and the only victim of his to be stabbed.[15] |
| Martha Morrison | September 1974 | 17 | Portland, Oregon | Solved | Victim remained unidentified until 2015.[16] |
| Linda Pagano | 17 | Akron or Strongsville, Ohio | Unsolved, identified | A teenager who disappeared from her home in Akron, Ohio, on September 1, 1974, following an argument with her stepfather. Initially, Pagano was thought to have run away. On February 5, 1975, a partial skeleton belonging to a young white female was discovered in a park in nearby Strongsville. The young woman had been killed by a gunshot to the head. However, the case was never connected to Pagano's disappearance. Due to a clerical error, the skeleton was not added to NamUs or other databases until 2016, when the case was rediscovered by an amateur genealogist. In 2018, forensic DNA analysis confirmed the remains as belonging to Pagano. Her stepfather, the only potential suspect, died in 1990.[17] | |
| Gypsy Hill killings | January 24 – February 2, 1976 | 14, 17 | San Mateo County, California | Unsolved | Victims of an unidentified serial killer.[18] |
| Oakland County Child Murders | February 1976 – March 1977 | 10–12 | Oakland County, Michigan | Unsolved | During a 13-month period, four children (two girls and two boys) were abducted and murdered with their bodies left in various locations in suburban Detroit. Each child was held alive from 4 to 19 days before being killed. The boys were sexually assaulted. Their deaths triggered a murder investigation which at the time was the largest in U.S. history.[19] The murders are still unsolved. |
| Randall Reffett and Samuel Stapleton | May 14, 1976 | 15, 14 | Chicago, Illinois | Solved | Victims of serial killer John Wayne Gacy.[20] |
| William Carroll Jr. | June 13, 1976 | 16 | Chicago, Illinois | Solved | Victim of serial killer John Wayne Gacy. |
| James Haakenson | August 5, 1976 | 16 | Chicago, Illinois | Solved | Unidentified until 2017; victim of serial killer John Wayne Gacy. |
| Kenneth Parker and Michael Marino | October 24, 1976 | 16, 14 | Chicago, Illinois | Solved | Victims of serial killer John Wayne Gacy. |
| Evelyn Colon | December 13–19, 1976 | 15 | White Haven, Pennsylvania | Pending | Unidentified until 2021; alleged killer has been charged.[21] |
| Oklahoma Girl Scout murders | June 12, 1977 | 8–11 | Mayes County, Oklahoma | Unsolved | Three girls murdered while at a summer camp. The prime suspect has since died and DNA samples from the killer are now insufficient to process.[22] |
| Robert Winch | November 10, 1977 | 16 | Chicago, Illinois | Solved | Victim of serial killer John Wayne Gacy. |
| Brian Glenfeldt and Belinda Worley | January 8, 1978 | 17 | Hialeah, Florida | Solved | Victims of serial killer John Errol Ferguson.[23] [24] |
| Bear Brook murders | November 1978 | 11 months, 2–4, 7 | Allenstown, New Hampshire | Unidentified (one child) | Four victims total, three were children and one was an adult female.[25] The adult, oldest and youngest victims were identified in June 2019 as Marlyse Honeychurch, Marie Vaughn and Sarah McWaters. Honeychurch was the mother of the two now-identified children, who were half-sisters. The middle child, determined to be the daughter of serial killer Terry Peder Rasmussen, remains unidentified.[26] |
| Kerry Graham and Francine Trimble | December 1978 | 15, 14 | Willits, California | Unsolved | Victims remained unidentified until 2015.[27] [28] |
| Robert Piest | December 11, 1978 | 15 | Chicago, Illinois | Solved | Final victim of serial killer John Wayne Gacy. |
| Devonna Nelson | 1979 | 14 | Missoula, Montana | Solved | Presumed victim of probable serial killer Wayne Nance. She remained unidentified until 2009.[29] |
| Etan Patz | May 25, 1979 | 6 | New York City, New York | Solved, body never found | Perpetrator sentenced to 25-years-to-life in April 2017.[30] |
| Atlanta murders of 1979–81 | July 21, 1979 – March 12, 1981 | 9–14 | Atlanta, Georgia | Solved | Victims of a serial killer.[31] |
| Tammy Vincent | September 1979 | 16 | Tiburon, California | Unsolved | Victim remained unidentified until 2007.[32] |
| Tammy Alexander | November 9, 1979 | 16 | Caledonia, New York | Unsolved, identified | Teenager shot and left in a cornfield in upstate New York. Alexander was a hitchhiker, having run away from a broken home in Florida, and was never reported missing until years after her death. Known previously as only "Caledonia Jane Doe" or "Cali Doe", Alexander remained unidentified until 2015.[33] |
| Sherri Jarvis | November 1, 1980 | 14 | Huntsville, Texas | Unsolved, identified | Victim remained unidentified until 2021.[34] |
| Carol Cole | December 1980 | 17 | Bellevue, Louisiana | Unsolved, identified | Victim remained unidentified until 2015.[35] |
| Adam Walsh | July 27, 1981 | 6 | Indian River County, Florida | Solved | Victim of serial killer Ottis Toole.[36] |
| Frieda Powell | 1982 | 15 | Ringgold, Texas | Solved, body never found | Henry Lee Lucas, now deceased, confessed to killing his teenage girlfriend while in Texas. Authorities believe his confession, yet efforts to confirm the remains identified by Lucas to be hers were inconclusive.[37] [38] |
| Shannah Wicklund | April 14, 1982 | 9 | Clearview, Washington | Solved | Murdered along with her mother and a neighbor in a revenge killing.[39] |
| Dawn Olanick | Early July 1982 | 17 | Blairstown, New Jersey | Solved | A teenaged murder victim found at the edge of a cemetery. A couple confessed in 2005 to killing her, but without her identity there was not enough information to put a case together.[40] [41] Following Olanick's identification, the couple who confessed in 2005 was charged with her murder. |
| Ricky Stetson | August 22, 1982 | 11 | Portland, Maine | Solved | The first of three victims of John Joubert and the only victim murdered in Maine.[42] |
| Alisha Heinrich | December 3 or 4, 1982 | 18 months | Moss Point, Mississippi | Unsolved | A toddler thrown from a bridge into a river. Known only as "Delta Dawn", Heinrich remained unidentified until 2020. Her mother, who disappeared alongside her, remains missing.[43] |
| Redhead murders | 1981–1992 | 9–17 | Various | Unsolved, unidentified | Victims of an unidentified serial killer that were left on the side of highways. Not all presumed victims have been verified to be linked.[44] |
| St. Louis Jane Doe | February 1983 | 10 | St. Louis, Missouri | Unsolved, unidentified | Found decapitated and naked from the waist down in the basement of an abandoned building.[45] [46] |
| Danny Joe Eberle | September 18, 1983 | 13 | Bellevue, Nebraska | Solved | Second victim of John Joubert.[47] |
| Christoper Walden | December 2, 1983 | 12 | Papillion, Nebraska | Solved | Third and final victim on John Joubert.[48] |
| Colleen Orsborn | March 19, 1984 | 15 | Daytona Beach, Florida | Solved | Victim remained unidentified until 2011.[49] |
| Marcella Bachmann | September – October 1984 | 16 | Missoula, Montana | Solved | Presumed victim of probable serial killer Wayne Nance. She remained unidentified until 2006. |
| Shari Smith | May 31 / June 1, 1985 | 17 | Lexington County, South Carolina | Solved | A 17-year-old who was abducted from the driveway of her home. Her killer called her family repeatedly to taunt them; even after the victim's death. Larry Gene Bell was later convicted of her murder and executed.[50] |
| Debra Helmick | June 15, 1985 | 9 | Richland County, South Carolina | Solved | A girl abducted from her front yard and subsequently murdered by Larry Gene Bell, also responsible for the abduction and murder of Shari Smith. He was later convicted and executed for her murder. |
| Aroostook County Jane Doe | December 7, 1985 | Newborn | Frenchville, Maine | Pending | Infant born alive then abandoned who remained unidentified until 2022. Her mother, Lee Ann Daigle, was charged with murder.[51] |
| Darcie Frackenpohl | 1987 | 17 | Sacramento, California | Solved | Victim remained unidentified for several months.[52] |
| Deanna Criswell | November 23, 1987 | 16 | Marana, Arizona | Solved, identified | Victim remained unidentified until 2015.[53] |
| April Tinsley | April 1–2, 1988 | 8 | Fort Wayne, Indiana | Solved | Suspect arrested on July 15, 2018.[54] |
| Aundria Bowman | March 11, 1989 | 14 | Hamilton, Michigan | Pending | A teenager listed as a missing person for over thirty years, after her adoptive parents reported her as a runaway. Her remains were located in February 2020 after her adoptive father confessed to her murder. He was previously charged with the 1980 murder of a woman in Virginia.[55] |
| Sue Ann Huskey | September 1989 | 17 | Williamson County, Texas | Unsolved, identified | Victim remained unidentified until January 2020.[56] |
| Jacob Wetterling | October 22, 1989 | 11 | St. Joseph, Minnesota | Solved | Victim remained a missing person for nearly 27 years before the location of his remains was disclosed by Jacob's murderer.[57] |
| Victim(s) | Date of death | Age | Location | Status | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anjelica Castillo | July 18, 1991 | 4 | Astoria, New York | Solved | Victim remained unidentified until 2013.[58] |
| Mandy Lemaire | August 22, 1991 | 11 | Tazlina, Alaska | Unsolved | Suspect's conviction was overturned in 1999. He died before the completion of the second trial.[59] |
| Megan Pratt | September 1991 | 3 | Brooksville, Florida | Solved, body never found | [60] |
| 1991 Austin yogurt shop killings | December 6, 1991 | 13-17 | Austin, Texas | Unsolved | Four girls raped, shot, and burnt in an I Can't Believe It's Yogurt shop in Austin, Texas.[61] |
| Holly Piirainen | August 5, 1993 | 10 | Sturbridge, Massachusetts | Unsolved | [62] |
| Kori Lamaster | August 1993 | 17 | California | Unsolved | Victim remained unidentified until 2013.[63] |
| JonBenét Ramsey | December 26, 1996 | 6 | Boulder, Colorado | Unsolved | [64] |
| Amber Creek | February 1997 | 14 | Burlington, Wisconsin | Solved[65] | Subject remained unidentified until 1998.[66] |
| Peaches | June 15, 1997 | 15–30 | Lakeview, New York | Unsolved, unidentified | Possible victim of an unidentified serial killer.[67] |
| Christina Marie Williams | June 12, 1998 | 13 | Seaside, California | Solved[68] | |
| Columbine High School massacre | April 20, 1999 | 14–17 | Littleton, Colorado | Solved | A mass shooting where ten children (including Rachel Scott and Cassie Bernall) were murdered, along with two 18-year-old students and a teacher.[69] [70] |
| Molly Bish | June 27, 2000 | 16 | Warren, Massachusetts | Unsolved | [71] |
| Iriana DeJesus | July 30, 2000 | 5 | Philadelphia, Pennsylvania | Unsolved | Presumed victim of FBI Top Ten Most Wanted fugitive Alexis Flores.[72] |
| Brittney and Bobby Fisher | April 10, 2001 | 10, 12 | Scottsdale, Arizona | Unsolved | Children of FBI Top Ten Most Wanted fugitive Robert William Fisher.[73] |
| Red Lake shootings | March 21, 2005 | 15 - 16 | Red Lake, Minnesota | Solved | Murder–suicide.[74] |
| West Nickel Mines School shooting | October 2, 2006 | 7–13 | Nickel Mines, Pennsylvania | Solved | Murder–suicide.[75] |
| Erika Hill | February 25, 2007 | 15 | Fitchburg, Wisconsin | Solved | Victim remained unidentified until 2015.[76] |
| Daniel Benoit | June 22, 2007 | 7 | Fayetteville, Georgia | Solved | Murdered by his father, WWE star Chris Benoit, who committed suicide 2 days later.[77] |
| Crandon, Wisconsin shooting | October 7, 2007 | 14–17 | Crandon, Wisconsin | Solved | Murder–suicide.[78] |
| Caylee Anthony | June – December 2008 | 2–3 | Orlando, Florida | Unsolved | Cause of death ruled a homicide by medical examiner.[79] |
| Brittney Gary | November 2, 2008 | 17 | Jennings, Louisiana | Unsolved | Presumed victim of unidentified serial killer.[80] |
| Baby Boy Horry | December 3, 2008 | Newborn | Conway, South Carolina | Pending | Cause of death ruled as hypothermia, investigated as homicide.[81] The boy's mother was later arrested in March, 2020, in connection with the homicide.[82] |
| Brittanee Drexel | Late May 2009 | 17 | Georgetown, South Carolina | Pending | A teenager who disappeared after leaving her home in Rochester, New York to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina without parental permission in April 2009. Her remains were located in 2022 after a suspect, Raymond Moody, confessed to her murder.[83] |
| Victim(s) | Date of death | Age | Location | Status | Description |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting | December 14, 2012 | 6–7 | Newtown, Connecticut | Solved | Murder–suicide.[84] |
| Bella Bond | June 2015 | 2 | Boston, Massachusetts | Solved | Victim remained unidentified until September 2015.[85] [86] |
| Tylee Ryan | September 9, 2019 | 16 | Rexburg, Idaho | Solved | Murdered by their mother, Lori Vallow Daybell[87] and her then-lover and now husband Chad Daybell.[88] |
| J. J. Vallow | September 23, 2019 | 7 | |||
| Jacob Hall | October 1, 2016 | 6 | Townville, South Carolina | Solved | Hall was mortally wounded on September 28.[89] |
| Abigail Williams and Liberty German | February 13, 2017 | 13, 14 | Deer Creek Township, Indiana | Pending | Suspect arrested in 2022.[90] |
| Bianca Devins | July 14, 2019 | 17 | Utica, New York | Solved | Perpetrator was sentenced to life imprisonment.[91] |
| Tristyn Bailey | May 9, 2021 | 13 | St. Johns County, Florida | Solved | Perpetrator was sentenced to life imprisonment.[92] |
| Robb Elementary School shooting | May 24, 2022 | 9–11[93] | Uvalde, Texas | Solved | |
| Covenant School shooting | March 27, 2023 | 9[94] | Nashville, Tennessee | Solved | |
| Preston Lord | October 28, 2023 | 16[95] | Queen Creek, Arizona | Pending | Suspects arrested in March 2024[96] |
| Jonathan Lewis Jr. | November 7, 2023 | 17[97] | Las Vegas, Nevada | Solved | |
| Jocelyn Nungaray | June 16, 2024 | 12[98] | Houston, Texas | Pending | Suspects arrested in June 2024. |