Murder of Adam Walsh
1981 child murder in Hollywood, Florida, US
Adam John Walsh (November 14, 1974 – c. July 27, 1981) was an American child who was abducted from a Sears department store at the Hollywood Mall in Hollywood, Florida, on July 27, 1981. His severed head was found two weeks later in a drainage canal alongside Highway 60/Yeehaw Junction in rural Indian River County, Florida. Walsh's death garnered national interest and became the basis for the 1983 television film Adam, seen by 38 million people in its original airing.
Adam's father, John Walsh, became an advocate for victims of violent crimes and was the host of the television program America's Most Wanted. He has also hosted The Hunt with John Walsh and In Pursuit with John Walsh.
Convicted serial killer Ottis Toole confessed to Adam's murder, but was never convicted of the crime because evidence was reportedly lost and Toole later recanted his confession. Toole died in prison of liver failure on September 15, 1996. No new evidence has come to light since then, and police announced in December 2008 that the Walsh case was closed and that they were satisfied that Toole was the killer.
Case history
Kidnapping and murder
On the afternoon of July 27, 1981, Adam accompanied his mother Revé Drew on a shopping trip to the Hollywood Mall (today Hollywood Hills Plaza) in Hollywood, Florida (26°00′46″N 80°10′30″W).
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This entry incorporates text from “Murder of Adam Walsh” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.