

The Desperate Search For Missing Boy Johnny Gosch But Gosch’s parents knew something was terribly wrong. However, since there had been no note or demand for ransom, the police assumed Johnny Gosch had run away, and the law said they could wait 72 hours to declare him missing and begin searching for him. John and his wife, Noreen, frantically alerted the local police. According to Slate, John later told The Des Moines Register, “We went searching and found his little red wagon. John Gosch quickly started searching the neighborhood for his son. National Center for Missing and Exploited Children Johnny Gosch was just 12 years old when he disappeared on Sept. The dog had come home - but Gosch had not. This was odd, as young Gosch should have been done with his route by then. According to Iowa Cold Cases, his father usually went with him, but John David Gosch had decided to stay home that fateful Sunday morning.Īround 7:45 a.m., the Gosch household received a phone call from a disgruntled neighbor wondering why his newspaper hadn’t been delivered yet. 5, 1982, Johnny Gosch woke up before sunrise and left the house with his dachshund, Gretchen, to deliver newspapers in West Des Moines, Iowa. The Unexplained Disappearance Of Iowa Paperboy Johnny Gosch However, despite these claims, Johnny Gosch remains missing to this day. Even his own mother says he showed up at her house one night in March 1997 to let her know he was alive. In the 40 years since Gosch’s disappearance, numerous people around the United States have reported sightings of him. This soon sparked the campaign to feature information about missing children on milk cartons across the country.

So when another boy disappeared under eerily similar circumstances two years later, a fellow Des Moines resident had the bright idea to print both the boys’ photos on milk cartons from a local dairy. A few witnesses said they’d seen him giving directions to a strange man in a blue car, but police initially assumed he’d simply run away, which gave his kidnapper plenty of time to escape.Įven once the search for Gosch began in earnest, though, there were no real clues to follow. The only sign of the young boy was his little red wagon. Twitter/WHO 13 News Johnny Gosch with his newspaper bag shortly before his disappearance.
