Resources for Missing Persons

According to current statistics, 4,000 people in the United States go missing every day. Sometimes a child suddenly vanishes from the bus stop or the local park or even from their own yard or bedroom. Or a teenager doesn�t return home after a walk to the neighborhood grocery store or a bike ride or a party with friends. Other times, an adult is mysteriously absent from their job or neighbors haven�t seen them for several days, and family and friends haven�t heard from them either.

Missing Person Photos

Angelo Gene Puglisi











Angelo, date, approximate 1976; Age-progression to age 50 (date, approximate 2015); Charles Pierce; Wayne Chapman; Chapman's converted van
Date Missing 08/21/1976
Missing From
Lawrence, Massachusetts
Missing Classification Non-Family Abduction
Sex Male
Race
White
Date of Birth 09/02/1965 (57)
Age 10 years old
Height and Weight 4'0, 65 pounds
Clothing/Jewelry Description A bathing suit, a towel and sneakers.
Medical Conditions Angelo is mildly epileptic. He will need hospital treatment if he has a seizure.
Associated Vehicle(s) Converted van that had once been a blue delivery truck (accounted for)
Markings and/or Distinguishing Characteristics Caucasian male. Brown hair, brown eyes. Angelo has three scars along his spine and a skin discoloration on his chest. His nickname is Andy.
Details of Disappearance Angelo was last seen at the Higgins Memorial Swimming Pool, a public pool approximately 100 yards from his family's home near their home at the Stadium Housing Projects on East Dalton Street in Lawrence, Massachusetts on August 21, 1976.
His mother told investigators that he called home at about 3:30 p.m. that day and spoke to one of his brothers; Angelo gave no indication that anything was wrong at the time. A lifeguard at the pool reported that he saw Angelo walking around the area at approximately 5:45 p.m.; that was the last time anyone has seen him.
Investigators initially believed Angelo was a runaway. He was the product of a broken home and they speculated that he might have felt torn between his parents. Foul play is now suspected in Angelo's disappearance. His parents were both considered suspects in his and have not officially been removed from the list of possible offenders, but investigators doubt either one was involved in his disappearance.
One suspect in Angelo's disappearance is Charles Pierce, who was a resident of Haverhill, Massachusetts in 1976. A photo of Pierce is posted with this summary.
He confessed to two abductions that occurred in the 1970s: one was the of Janice Pockett, a girl who disappeared from Connecticut in 1973; and another involving an unidentified boy from Lawrence, Massachusetts. It's believed that Pierce was referring to Angelo's by that description. He claimed that he sexually assaulted and buried the unidentified boy in a grave near Janice's; neither body has been discovered.
Pierce was familiar with the Lawrence area and was a suspect in more than a dozen children's disappearances from the 1950s through the 1970s in New England. He was convicted of a Massachusetts murder and was serving a 20-year prison term when he died in 1999.
Another suspect in Angelo's is Wayne W. Chapman, a Providence, Rhode Island native who may have been a pedophile associate of Pierce. Chapman was arrested in Waterloo, New York in September 1976, while driving a converted van that had once been a blue delivery truck.
Chapman's vehicle closely resembled the description of a van one of Angelo's friends observed near the pool area where Angelo was last seen. Photos of Chapman and his vehicle are posted with this summary. A witness told authorities that he and another boy found a large pit in the woods near the pool; the friend stated that the hole could have been large enough to hold a child's body. When he returned to the area a few days later, the pit had been filled in. This spot has never been proven to be a gravesite.
Investigators also found child sexual abuse images, a starter pistol and a sock which appeared to be bloodstained in Chapman's van. The sock was eventually lost and it was never proven whether the substance on it was blood. Chapman was later convicted of the 1975 rapes of two boys; he lured both boys from the same swimming pool Angelo would later vanish from.
Rhode Island police have a letter stating that Chapman was working in that state at the time of Angelo's disappearance. Chapman has never been charged in connection with Angelo's . He served his prison sentence, and was civilly committed as a sexually dangerous offender, but he was released in 2019. He is in his seventies and has Parkinson's Disease, and after his release he was sent to a Boston medical facility, although his sex offender registration lists him as "homeless."
Angelo's childhood friend, Melanie Perkins, produced a documentary about his entitled Have You Seen Andy?. Two excavations near Lawrence in 1999 failed to locate Angelo's remains. His remains open and unsolved.
Investigating Agency
Lawrence Police Department
978-794-5900
978-794-5925
Other
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
The Boston Globe
The Eagle-Tribune
Have You Seen Andy?
Newspaper Archive
The Detroit News
The Doe Network
Fox 25 Boston
WCVB 5
The Boston Herald

Missing Person Photos

A missing person is a person who has disappeared and whose status as alive or dead cannot be confirmed as their location and condition are unknown. A person may go missing through a voluntary disappearance, or else due to an accident, crime, death in a location where they cannot be found (such as at sea), or many other reasons. In most parts of the world, a missing person will usually be found quickly. While criminal abductions are some of the most widely reported missing person cases, these account for only 2 to 5 percent of missing children in Europe. By contrast, some missing person cases remain unresolved for many years. Laws related to these cases are often complex since, in many jurisdictions, relatives and third parties may not deal with a person's assets until their death is considered proven by law and a formal death certificate issued. The situation, uncertainties, and lack of closure or a funeral resulting when a person goes missing may be extremely painful with long-lasting effects on family and friends. A number of organizations seek to connect, share best practices, and disseminate information and images of missing children to improve the effectiveness of missing children investigations, including the International Commission on Missing Persons, the International Centre for Missing & Exploited Children (ICMEC), as well as national organizations, including the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children in the US, Missing People in the UK, Child Focus in Belgium, and The Smile of the Child in Greece.

Resources for Missing Persons

According to current statistics, 4,000 people in the United States go missing every day. Sometimes a child suddenly vanishes from the bus stop or the local park or even from their own yard or bedroom. Or a teenager doesn�t return home after a walk to the neighborhood grocery store or a bike ride or a party with friends. Other times, an adult is mysteriously absent from their job or neighbors haven�t seen them for several days, and family and friends haven�t heard from them either.

Missing Person Photos