The Disappearance of Angelo “Andy” Puglisi

Images courtesy of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children

Information courtesy of The Charley Project.

***Trigger Warning***

Today’s post includes a discussion of crimes against children, including rape. While not graphic, the details may be upsetting. Reader discretion is advised. To report child abuse or other crimes against children, please contact your local authorities.

To Support True Crime Musings, click here.

Disclaimer: This blog post is for informational and entertainment purposes only, and it is not meant to cause harm to anyone connected with the case. Please do not contact, threaten, harm, malign, or otherwise intimidate those mentioned in the post. Please do not release any personal information of the people mentioned in this post, and do not join in attacks conducted by others. Per U.S. law, every person directly or indirectly connected with this case is innocent until proven guilty.

***Please share this post! Your shares could bring Angelo home.***

About Angelo

Angelo “Andy” Puglisi was born to his parents, Angelo and Faith Puglisi, on September 2nd, 1965. As the oldest of five children, he was described as “a good kid” who was “always willing to help.” At the time of his disappearance, he and his family lived at the Stadium Housing Projects.

His parents would later divorce in 1975, which resulted in his father moving to New Hampshire.

From an early age, Andy cared about others. One of his childhood friends, Melanie, remembered meeting him when he and her older brother were playing football. She asked to play, and at first, her brother said no. However, Andy stood up for her and said that if she couldn’t play, then he wasn’t going to play either. As he grew up, he would quickly become known for his kindness and gentleness.

In the 1970s, Lawrence, Massachusetts was considered one of the poorest cities in the United States. As of the most recent Census, nearly 20% of residents live in poverty. Despite this, life was good for Andy. He adored his parents and his siblings, and there were around 300 kids to play with in his housing project. A new public swimming pool, the Higgins Memorial Swimming Pool, had opened across the street, and it quickly became a popular hangout spot on hot days, especially for the local children. This would become the same pool that Andy would vanish from.

Disappearance

On the day of his disappearance, Andy went to the Higgins Memorial Swimming Pool. It is unknown when he arrived at the pool or what occurred that morning. However, there are a few confirmed events that help to establish a timeline:

• At 2 PM, his friend, Melanie Perkins, left the pool with her brother. Andy opted to stay, as he wasn’t ready to go home.
• At 3:30 PM, Andy’s mother, Faith, reported that Andy called home and spoke to one of his brothers. At that point, there weren’t any signs of anything wrong.
• At 5:45 PM, a lifeguard saw him leaving the pool. This was the last confirmed sighting.

Andy’s siblings came home soon after, and they quickly noted his absence. This resulted in his family and neighbors searching for him at the pool and the surrounding areas, which included a dump, nearby woods that lead to Interstate 495, and the housing development.

At some point, the police were called, and they launched a massive search that involved state troopers, military personnel, and volunteers. They worked day and night for six days, at which time the official search was called off.

At first, the authorities believed that Andy had run away since his parents went through a difficult divorce. Their theory was that he ran away because he felt torn between his parents. However, when he failed to turn up during the official search, investigators began to consider the possibility of foul play.

Later Developments

Since Andy’s disappearance, a few suspects have risen to the surface, including Charles Pierce and Wayne Chapman.

In September 1976, approximately one month after Andy’s disappearance, Wayne Chapman was arrested in New York State for a firearms violation during a routine traffic stop. At the time, he was driving a converted van that had been a blue truck, similar to the one Andy’s friend noticed near the pool the day he vanished. Once the authorities searched his van, they found child pornography, rope, tape, handcuffs, a fake police badge, a sock that appeared to be bloodstained, and a starter’s pistol. Police later suspected him in the disappearances of over a dozen children. He was charged with several crimes against children, including the rapes of two boys in 1975, which occurred after he lured them from the same swimming pool Andy disappeared from.

Chapman was never charged in connection with Andy’s disappearance. He served his prison sentence, after which he was civilly committed as a sexually dangerous offender. Despite his status, he was released in 2019, after which he was committed to a medical facility in Boston. He died in October 2021.

A second suspect, Charles Pierce, arose after he confessed to two different abductions in the 1970s; Janice Pockett, who disappeared in 1973 from Connecticut; and an unidentified boy from Lawrence, Massachusetts. Some believe that the unidentified boy was Andy, and although Pierce claimed he sexually assaulted and buried the boy near Janice, neither body has been located. He was convicted of rape and murder, and he was serving a 20-year prison sentence when he died in 1999.

In 1998, Melanie Perkins, a friend of Andy’s who was with him at the pool that day, began filming the documentary Have You Seen Andy? The documentary was released in 2007 and featured on HBO Cinemax. The following year, it won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Investigative Journalism.

Since 2007, Melanie has worked to keep Andy’s case in the spotlight. Unfortunately, after the two main suspects died, the case stalled. As of this writing, Angelo “Andy” Puglisi remains missing.

My Thoughts

The disappearance of Andy Puglisi is incredibly haunting and unnerving. A young boy goes to the local swimming pool across the street from his house to cool off and hang out with his friends. What should have been a fun, uneventful day quickly spirals into a nightmare for his family and friends, one that’s continued for more than 40 years.

Unfortunately, except for Melanie’s documentary, there is very little information about Andy’s case. We don’t know when Andy arrived at the pool, we don’t know who he spoke with while he was there, and we don’t know if there were any suspicious activities at the pool or in the surrounding areas. It’s only years later that we find out that a truck was at the pool that day, similar to the one driven by Wayne Chapman.

These information gaps aren’t too surprising given that the police originally assumed him to be a runaway. The only problem is that we don’t have any solid evidence that he was unhappy with his life. Of course, you could argue that his parents’ divorce played a role, especially after reading this police report. According to the report:

Andy’s mother Faith is…divorced from his father and the separation has not been one of great accord. During the investigation[,] accusations and counter-accusations between the father and mother have only tended to muddy an already unclear disappearance.

Police Report, Haveyouseenandy.com

Even though the police moved away from the runaway theory, some still believe that he ran away and/or the divorce played a role in his disappearance. They argue that divorce can be incredibly difficult for children, especially if it’s a contentious one.

However, we don’t have any evidence that the divorce was a factor in his disappearance. By all accounts, he was a happy kid who cared deeply about his family and friends. That was one thing that appeared in my research repeatedly, his caring nature. Why would someone that concerned about others run away and cut off contact with everyone for over four decades? Considering he was only ten years old at the time, it’s unlikely he would’ve had the ability to leave and start a new life. Even if one of his parents was involved, the police would’ve found a connection by now.

With all of this in mind, it’s safe to say that the runaway theory is the least likely possibility.

In the years since his disappearance, two suspects have emerged: Charles Pierce and Wayne Chapman. It makes sense why police suspect them since they were both convicted of crimes against children. However, the case has stalled since both of them have died. Despite this, we can take a closer look at the two of them.

As a suspect, Chapman is particularly interesting to me. He confessed to raping two boys in 1975 after luring them away from the same swimming pool that Andy disappeared from. That was only a year before his disappearance. He also drove a vehicle that matched the description of one at the pool that day. Not only that, but the authorities recovered a variety of suspicious items in his van. These include things like child pornography, rope, tape, handcuffs, a fake police badge, a stained sock, and a starter’s pistol. When taken all together, these items paint a dark picture of a child predator who posed as a cop to lure children away, where he could then harm them.

The only problem is that even though he was suspected of being involved in the disappearances of over a dozen children, the police never found anything to connect Wayne Chapman to Andy. If he knew anything, he took those secrets to the grave in 2021.

We run into a similar problem with Charles Pierce, the second suspect. He confessed to two different abductions in the 1970s: Janice Pockett and an unidentified boy from Lawrence, Massachusetts. He also claimed to have killed both children and buried the boy near Janice. At the time of his death, he was serving a prison sentence for rape and murder, so his involvement isn’t out of the realm of possibility. The only problem is that neither body has been recovered, and the police never found any evidence connecting him to the disappearance of either child. Given his past convictions, he could’ve been involved, or he could be lying for some ulterior motive. Either is a possibility. But just like Chapman, Pierce died, taking any secrets with him to the grave.

Unfortunately, that’s where the case stops. We have a couple of suspects that are loosely connected to Andy’s disappearance, but any evidence is circumstantial at best.

At this point, it’s going to take someone coming forward or the discovery of Andy’s remains for this case to receive any kind of closure. Even though both of the main suspects have died, we still need to find him. He deserves a proper burial, and his family deserves closure and answers.

And you can be that person. All it takes is one phone call or one anonymous message to resolve this case once and for all. Do you know anything?

***

If you’re interested in learning more about the disappearance of Angelo “Andy” Puglisi, there are a lot of articles, although I had a hard time finding ones from the early days of the investigation. The most detailed source I found was the “Have You Seen Andy?” website, which provided a timeline with news articles, police reports, and more.

The following sources helped me as I wrote this post:

• Boston.com
• Have You Seen Andy?
• The Charley Project
• The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children
• Disappearedblog.com

If you have any information about the disappearance of Angelo “Andy” Puglisi, please contact the Massachusetts State Police at 1-978-745-8908 or the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children at 1-800-843-5678.

What do you think happened? Let me know in the comments.