The National Center for Missing & Exploited Children is calling on the public to help solve the mystery of Christopher Dansby’s disappearance dating back to 1989.
At just two years old, Christopher was last seen with his mother, Alison Dansby, on May 18, 1989. They were heading to Martin Luther King Playground, located at the intersection of Lenox Avenue and West 114th Street in New York City.
According to the NCMEC, Alison briefly entrusted Christopher to some relatives at the playground while she made a quick trip to a nearby grocery store. Upon her return, Christopher, who had been playing with other kids, was nowhere to be found.
Christopher’s grandmother mentioned she had looked away for a short moment, during which Christopher disappeared.
“The journey has been long and painful,” Alison expressed in the past. “So much time has passed without closure. It’s something I can’t accept. One of my children is missing, and I still have no answers.”
In a chillingly similar incident, nearly three months later, on August 10, 1989, Shane Walker, another two-year-old, vanished in the same way from the same playground.
“I turned my head and turned back, and Shane was gone,” his mother, Rosa Glover, told ABC 7 New York.
Following Shane’s disappearance, NYPD Deputy Chief Ronald J. Fenrich stated that although “law enforcement could not definitively state” that the children were taken by the same person, the similarities in their disappearance were striking.
Both vanished during the evening, on a Tuesday, and both had been playing with the same two children in the park.
The children’s stories were subsequently featured on an “Unsolved Mysteries” episode on Netflix.
Retired NYPD inspector Ken Lindahl said that many theories have emerged over the years, with the most promising being that children could have possibly been sold on the black market, and not killed.
“We don’t have bodies,” Lindahl said on the show, according to Oxygen. “We have two missing kids. You gotta have belief that maybe they survived.”
Another hopeful theory is that someone who couldn’t have children maybe have taken the boys to raise as their own.
“Someone who wants a baby who is not qualified to adopt a baby might steal a baby or hire someone to do so.” Deputy Chief Ronald J. Fenrich said.
At the time, Christopher stood 2 feet, 6 inches tall, and weighed around 30 pounds. He has black hair, brown eyes, and a birthmark on his neck that resembles an “8.”
Shane stood 3 feet tall and weighed around 30 pounds. He has black hair, brown eyes, and a scar under his chin.
Anyone with information is urged to contact NCMEC at 1-800-THE-LOST.
The cases are being covered as part of CrimeOnline’s “Finding the Lost: Black and Missing” series, which will feature a missing Black person every day in February. The full series can be read here.
[Feature Photo: Christopher and Shane/NCMEC]
