Unfortunately, the child in the box was not the missing girl, who was found deceased a week later in a vacant home, where she’d wandered to and died of starvation. When asked why he’d waited a day to report the discovery, he said he’d been spying on students of the nearby Good Shepherd School and didn’t want the authorities to know why he was actually in the area. Believing what he’d seen the previous day was related, he contacted police.
The next day, Benonis was listening to the radio when he heard a report about a missing 4-year-old girl. According to Benonis, he believed the boy had actually been a doll and didn’t contact police about the discovery. The child had been wrapped in a blanket before being placed inside the box, and his head and shoulder were sticking out.
Knowing there were animal traps in the area, he pulled over and went into the wooded area, where he too came across the body. Benonis, a La Salle College junior, claimed to be driving his car along Susquehanna Road when he saw a rabbit dash into a nearby thicket.
Not wanting the authorities to confiscate his traps, he did not report the finding.Ī few days later, at 3:45pm on February 25, 26-year-old Frederick J. In late February 1957, a young man was checking his muskrat traps in the Fox Chase neighbourhood of Philadelphia, Philadelphia County, Pennsylvania when he discovered the body of a young boy inside a box.