On 27 November, 1987, 12-year-old Noosa school girl, Sian Kingi was grabbed off her push bike by Valmae Fay Beck and Barrie John Watts as she rode home from school. Beck and Watts gagged the innocent, terrified child. Watts then raped and bashed her. He then callously, and without remorse, cut her throat while his cowardly wife and mother of six watched on. Six days later, a fruit picker discovered Sian’s mutilated body, still dressed in her Year Seven Sunshine Beach School uniform, in a creek bed. The hunt for the killers and their arrest was led by Bob Atkinson, now Queensland’s police commissioner. As a result of thorough and dedicated police work by Queensland detectives, and in concert with New South Wales police, Beck and Watts were located hiding in a motel at Long Jetty on the NSW Central Coast a few weeks later. Police believe Beck and Watts are linked to the murders of Sharron Phillips, 20, in Brisbane’s outer west, Stella Mary Farrugia, 19, and Louise Bell, 10, in Adelaide. In 1995, Watts was convicted of the manslaughter of 31-year-old student, Helen Mary Feeney in late 1987. Beck gave evidence against Watts, though Ms Feeney’s body has never been found. In 2008 Beck was hospitalised and underwent heart surgery, but later died in hospital.

Marc Dutroux was a Belgian serial killer, convicted of having, in 1995 and 1996, kidnapped, tortured and sexually abused six girls, ranging in age from 8 to 19, four of whom died as a result. He was also convicted of having killed a suspected former accomplice, Bernard Weinstein. He was proven to be insane and is prison to this day.

In 1978 Gary Heidnik was jailed for four years for kidnap and rape. After his release he began to assemble a harm of sex slaves by kidnapping women in the New Jersey area. By 1986 six women were imprisoned in Heidnik’s basement where they were tortured and raped. Two of the women eventually died from torture and they were fed to the other women, along with dog food. One of the women managed to escape and Heidnik was convicted and sentenced to death, a sentence carried out by lethal injection on 6 July 1999.

• Between 1976 and 1994, almost 37,000 children were murdered. 66% were less than 1 years old and 58% of those from 1 - 4 years old were killed by beating with fists, or blunt objects or by kicking. 

• Family Members or Acquaintances commit most of the Child Murders. 

• Children under 18 account for 11% of all murder victims in the US in 1994. Nearly half of these 2,660 child victims were between 15 and 17.

• 1 in 5 child victims were known to be killed by another child.

• In most murders of a young child, a family member killed the child, while in most murders of an older child, age 15 to 17, the perpetrator was an acquaintance to the victim or was unknown to law enforcement authorities.

• 1976 - 1994 in family murder of a child 10% of victims were age 15 - 17, while in murders by strangers were 67% of victims were in this age category.

• 1 in 5 child murders were committed by a family member.

• Since the mid-1980’s the increases in the number and the rate of murder among 15- to 17-year-olds, particularly among black youth in this age range, outpaced changes in murder in all other age groups.

• Half of all child murders in 1994 were committed with a handgun; 7 in 10 victims aged 15 to 17 were killed with a handgun

In 1924, Nathan Freudenthal Leopold, Jr. and Richard Albert Loeb, two wealthy young men, murdered 14-year-old Bobby Franks to prove to themselves that they could commit a perfect crime. Here, Leopold, with his head lowered, walks with investigators to the area in Chicago where the corpse was hidden.

The Boy in the Box

On February 25, 1957 an unidentified boy was found dead in a cardboard box in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania USA. According to reports, the boy was found inside what used to be a baby bassinet’s box. He was naked and wrapped in a blanket with his arms folded across the stomach. The boy’s hair was also cut near the head in a hurried manner. The boy’s finger nails were trimmed neatly. His entire face and body was full of bruises. There have been several speculations regarding the boy’s death and identity. Among the most probable theories is one that involves a foster home located about a mile away from the dump site. This foster home had a similar box where the boy was found as well as identical blankets in which his body was wrapped.

Marc Dutroux was a Belgian serial killer, convicted of having, in 1995 and 1996, kidnapped, tortured and sexually abused six girls, ranging in age from 8 to 19, four of whom died as a result. He was also convicted of having killed a suspected former accomplice, Bernard Weinstein. He was proven to be insane and is prison to this day.

Charles Lindbergh Jr., son of the aviator, on his first birthday in 1931. A few months later, he was kidnapped from his East Amwell, N.J., home and murdered. The case prompted legislators to make kidnapping a federal crime.

Assisted by his mother Sarah and a teenage nephew named Stanford Clark, Gordon Stewart Northcott made a business and pleasure from abducting children and holding them at his isolated ranch in Riverside County, California, for his own depraved purposes and those of unidentified clients from Los Angeles. The children were subsequently killed and their bodies buried in the surrounding desert. In February 1928, the headless body of a Mexican boy was found in a ditch near Puent. Less than two months later two brothers aged eight and ten went missing after being seen in the company of Northcott at a boys’ club. Enquiries made at the Northcott ranch revealed that he had already fled to Canada. Searching the grounds the police officers found the missing head of the Mexican child. Under close questioning the nephew Clark described how Northcott had sexually abused the two young brothers before beating them to death. Sarah Northcott had little option now but to confess her part in her son’s crimes, including actively participating in one of the murders. When police intelligence had tracked Gordon Northcott down and extradited him back to California he was charged with just three murders. Although it was  confidently believed that Northcott’s total body count was as many as twenty, no further remains were found. Sarah Northcott , for her part, was sentenced to life imprisonment for the murder of the nine-year-old Mexican, and Stanford Clark agreed to turn state’s evidence against his uncle. Gordon Northcott was sentenced to hang. While he was awaiting sentence on San Quentin’s Death Row, Northcott was taken ill, and firmly believing that he was about to die made a full confession to Assistant Warden Clinton Duffy. This statement, which Duffy described as a catalogue of mass murder, torture and sodomy was retained on his file when Northcott got over his far from fatal sickness. Gordon Northcott was executed on 2 October 1930.

• Between 1976 and 1994, almost 37,000 children were murdered. 66% were less than 1 years old and 58% of those from 1 - 4 years old were killed by beating with fists, or blunt objects or by kicking. 

• Family Members or Acquaintances commit most of the Child Murders. 

• Children under 18 account for 11% of all murder victims in the US in 1994. Nearly half of these 2,660 child victims were between 15 and 17.

• 1 in 5 child victims were known to be killed by another child.

• In most murders of a young child, a family member killed the child, while in most murders of an older child, age 15 to 17, the perpetrator was an acquaintance to the victim or was unknown to law enforcement authorities.

• 1976 - 1994 in family murder of a child 10% of victims were age 15 - 17, while in murders by strangers were 67% of victims were in this age category.

• 1 in 5 child murders were committed by a family member.

• Since the mid-1980’s the increases in the number and the rate of murder among 15- to 17-year-olds, particularly among black youth in this age range, outpaced changes in murder in all other age groups.

• Half of all child murders in 1994 were committed with a handgun; 7 in 10 victims aged 15 to 17 were killed with a handgun

On October 1, 1993, 12 year old Polly Klaas was abducted from her Petaluma, California home. Richard Allen Davis raped and killed her. He was sentenced to death in 1996, he still remains on death row today.